STARK - Just Role-Playing. v1

 This is some ultra minimalist tabletop roleplaying "rules" I wrote. Rules is in quotation marks because they're anti-rules. A way of playing any game by stripping it to the bone. This post will be updated over time as I make changes. Rules after the jump. They assume basic familiarity with tabletop role-playing games.

Just Role-play.

STARK - v1 - By David Booth.

Thanks to: Questing Beast for highlighting the Free Kriegsspiel movement at just the right moment for me. The FKR Discord and greater FK blogosphere for confirming the same conclusions I was coming to, providing vindication and inspiration. Turns out I'm not totally insane. Or at least I have some company in the mad house.

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Never let the rules get in the way of a good time.

That's the premise. Numbers don't matter. This is more about an attitude than rules. You can apply the ideas here to any game. It's about doing what you do already, but with less overhead from the structure and ritual. If your mind can do it faster and seamlessly, why shackle it with procedure? Why add steps?

If you're a player, then just read the character creation section and you're good to go. The rest of it is mostly advice for the Referee on how to run a game and handle any situation that comes up.

Stuff to know:

• The "rules" - such as they are - are written in plain language where possible.
• Role-play is defined here as "simulating a world and characters within that world as if it were real."
• Events and outcomes are a result of answering the questions "what would happen?" or "what would I do?" with a realistic, common sense approach. Or whatever sounds the most fun.
• The aim is to lessen the impact of game logic and prevent it from interrupting role-play too much.
• The Referee is the rules. They are the the wizard behind the curtain, furiously pulling levers and pushing buttons, keeping things running.
• Everyone collaborates to decide how things happen, but the Referee makes the final call.
• Rulings over Rules. Usually this just means taking something to it's logical conclusion. The game fits the story, not the other way around.

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1.0 - CHARACTER CREATION

All you need to play is an idea for a character, a pair of 6-sided dice, a pencil and some note paper.

Your notes will be referred to as a "character sheet". You'll probably want to note the following things:

• Your character's name and and some relevant information about them (covered below).
• Equipment, possessions and any currency or valuables they have.
• Stuff you want to remember, like important people and places, current tasks and goals, etc.
  
  

The following sections cover character creation. This involves writing down some notes to help you role-play your character. Who they are, what they're good (or bad) at, and what they want. If you're ever stuck on what course of action to take, you can glance at these notes and ask "what would Geoff the Destroyer do?".

1.1) Character Concept

• Come up with a broad character concept. A description of who the character is, summed up in a short phrase or a couple of sentences at most.
• eg. "Half-Elf Wizard", "Wandering gunslinger with a bounty on her head", or "Conan the Barbarian, but a badger."
• Everything you need to know should be encapsulated in that concept.
• Would Badger the Barbarian be good in a fight? Yep.
• Would they know proper court etiquette? probably not.
• It's also perfectly fine to begin with no concept at all, start the game as a blank slate and develop the character through play. Note the concept when you think you've got it nailed down.
• It's also fine to alter the concept between sessions/adventures as you grow and evolve them in play.
• You can stop here if you like. The stuff below is about further defining the concept. But if you're confident that the concept says it all, then don't bother.

1.2) Background

• Choose a setting appropriate occupation the character had before taking to a life of adventure.
• eg. Baker, soldier, gong farmer, disgraced noble, street urchin.

1.3) Ancestry

• Pick a setting appropriate species or cultural background you belong to.
• eg. Dwarf, Elf, shiba inu, sentient planet the size of a basketball, Welsh.

1.4) Class

• Pick a heroic archetype that describes the kind of adventurer your character is.
• It can be a standard like Warrior, Wizard or Rogue. Or something from another game, literature, movies or whatever. Or totally made up.
• eg. Knight Crusader, Ghost hunter, Jazzamagician.
• If you want to pull a class from another game wholesale, that's fine. Just take the ideas and descriptions and role-play them, ignoring the numbers and mechanics.

1.5) Traits & Flaws

• Note down one exceptional trait, and one flaw.
• eg. Badger the Barbarian is very Strong, but rather Uncivilised.
• Along with all your other notes, these are touchstones to decide how things play out.
• eg. Badger gets thrown in a dungeon, after offending a Czar at a banquet with inappropriate behaviour. Badger can break out by bending the bars of his cell with his mighty thews.
• Try to show some restraint when picking strengths and flaws.
• It's only a flaw if it comes in to play often enough to complicate your adventures.
• Likewise, "I win" strengths like "super genius" probably aren't within the spirit of the game.
• The Referee should note down each character's flaws and try to present challenges that bring them in to play from time to time.
• It's up to the players to remind the Referee of their strengths if they wish to make use of them.
• Another version of this is to pick one each of the seven classical virtues/sins.
• Or take/invent "ability scores" like wot proper games do. Good at one, bad at another.

1.6) Skills

• If it helps to jog your memory, note down any particular skills or areas of expertise the character might have as a result of their concept (background, class, ancestry, etc).
• It's up to the player to remind the Referee of any useful skills that apply in a situation.
• eg. "I'm a haberdasher, so I might know what region this nobleman's doublet is produced in, impressing them with my knowledge."
• The Ref may allow one or two extra skills unrelated to a concept, to account for a more well rounded character that has unusual or additional training outside the norm.
• eg. A chambermaid that learned basic sword fighting from her father (an ex soldier).
• You develop and learn new skills like someone normally would. Want to become a better swordsman? Find a master to train you. Want to learn a new spell? Do menial tasks for a crotchety old archwizard, or plot to steal their spellbooks.
• If a player is feeling saucy, they may wish to note down a couple of things their character is bad at. Especially if it would be abnormal for their concept. Being sucky at stuff can be fun. No, really!
• eg. A burglar who's a master safecracker, but is somewhat of a bruiser and can't sneak around without making a racket.

1.7) Bonds

• Each character should have something or someone they are tied to personally. Something they would fight and/or die for. This can provide direction, incentive or even complications. 
• eg. a family member, a belief or moral code, an organisation, a faith, a strong friendship (with another player's character?), duty to a liege, their word, gold.
• The Referee will find these to be useful story and conflict fodder.
• Ref's should resist the urge to pervert the bonds against the player's will. They're best used to create compelling choices, not melodrama. Collaborate.

1.8) Goals

• Players should give their characters goals. Long and short term. Broad or narrow. Deep or shallow.
• The Referee should keep these goals in mind, and provide ample opportunities for players to work towards them. Like Bonds, they're also good conflict fodder.
• Goals can change. New ones can replace completed or abandoned ones. What's important is that you have them.
• Major goals: Find a long lost family member, become the archmage of the wizard's college, hunt down the bandits who murdered your parents, slay the dragon terrorising the country.
• Minor goals: Get a better suit of armour, catch and throttle that pickpocket urchin, whatever sidequests the locals have you on.

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2.0 - THE 2D6 ROLL

There are two main reasons a Referee may wish to call for a dice roll:

• A challenge or situation, where actions carry risks and consequences for failure, and the outcome is uncertain.
• Something the Ref is undecided on and thinks it would be fun to consult the oracle for guidance.

Roll 2d6 and total the result. Higher is better.

• The Referee interprets the result relative to the situation. A low roll might not go as planned, or outright fail. A high roll might go even better than expected.
• If a character is attempting something they would be particularly good or bad at, that is taken in to account when determining the outcome. Sometimes this means you may not need to roll at all.
• Usually the Referee is responsible for making the final ruling. But sometimes it can be fun to collaborate with the players to decide what happens.
• Or even give the players final say. Let them choose the form of their destroyer.

That's it. That's all you need to handle any situation. Roll some dice and figure out what the numbers mean.

2.1) The Chain

The table below is a rough metric for interpreting the result of a 2d6 roll.

2	3-4	5-9	10-11	12
Very Bad	Bad	Moderate	Good	Very Good

• Moderate would be the bare minimum for success on a task. V.Good is the equivalent of a "critical success", and V.Bad is like a fumble.
• This rating system can be applied to almost anything. You can make weapon damage tables, monster reactions, social encounters, random encounters, spells, etc.
• You could tweak the thresholds to [2 | 3-5 | 6-8 | 9-11 | 12], to increase the chances of a Bad/Good outcome.

2.2) Target Number 

• Use this if you want a more binary fail/success state.
• Set a default target of 7 or higher on 2d6 to succeed.
• Adjust difficulty by setting a higher or lower target number, or;
• Use the (dis)Advantage system;
• If circumstances would make the task easier then roll twice and use the better result.
• If it would be harder, then roll twice and use the worse result.
• Note that easy tasks probably aren't risky enough to warrant a roll. Ref's should consider ruling them as an automatic success and move on.

2.3) Opposed

• The player and Referee both roll at the same time. Higher wins.
• Useful for situations where two sides are in opposition/competition.

2.4) Difference

• On any of these rolls, the difference between the target (or opponent's roll) and the result could be used to determine additional things like damage or degree of success.
• eg. a difference of 0-2 would be the equivalent of a Moderate outcome, 3-4 good/bad, 5+ V.Good/bad.

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3.0 - GAME PROCEDURES

3.1) Health, Damage and Death

• The standard 2d6 resolution mechanic covers damage. The higher the roll, the more severe the wound in relation to the characters, weapons, etc involved.
• eg. a moderate roll might be a scratch or glancing blow, a good one is wounding, and a v.good might KO, cause mortal wounds, or outright kill as relative to the situation.
• A player tracks all the wounds their character has taken, as described in-world. You take a cut from a sword? You write down "sword cut on arm". You ingest poison? Write it down.
• Wounds and injuries have whatever effect you'd expect them to have within the fiction.
• You die when it seems likely that would happen.
• Permanent injury is possible if the fiction would dictate it. Got your face melted by a sorcerer? You're now permanently disfigured (magic healing notwithstanding).
• The threat of death and permanent injury should be as real to characters as it is to us in real life, and everyone should have the same instinct for self preservation that any living creature would.
• Unless, of course you want to run a more high-fantasy or cinematic game. Since rulings are relative, damage and threat of death are only as much of a factor as you want them to be.
• eg. A superhero could be slammed through a building, caught in an oil tanker explosion and crushed in a trash compactor before feeling any worse for wear.
• Recovering from injury is also dictated by common sense. Sometimes a bandage will do the trick. Sometimes bed rest. Sometimes magic. Sometimes amputation. Or leeches.

3.2) Combat

• As with the rest of the game, combat is simply a conversation. Two or more opponents declare their intentions, and if necessary the Referee will ask everyone involved to roll 2d6.
• If using Contest resolution, the higher roll gets their way.
• Or, everyone rolls simultaneously. Look at the results and try to figure out what happened based on who succeeded and by how much. This simulates the chaos of battle.
• When the question of "who goes first?" comes up, often the fiction itself will answer that. Or higher dice roll wins. Otherwise, character traits, types of attack, etc take precedence. Ask the question "what's faster? A or B?" If in doubt: roll for it. Or rock, paper, scissors. You'll figure it out.
• Combat doesn't necessarily have to be about exchanging blows. You can describe all sorts of actions that affect the battle.
• eg. Grunhilda the Champion pins the ogre's club down with her battleaxe. This provides an opening for Slink the Stabling to climb up the Ogre's back and plunge a dagger in to its skull, killing it.
• Use the environment, positioning, clever tactics, etc. to win fights. Your descriptions define what happens, or at least influence the interpretation of any dice rolls. The group as a whole work together to describe exciting scenes.
• The Referee should reward interesting, novel and compelling descriptions with success, so long as it seems possible. Dice need not be rolled if the tactic is sound or particularly cool.

3.3) Resources & Supply

• Adventurers will often need to take a lot of gear when they go out on expeditions. Like rope, travel rations, torches, oil and so on.
• This can be tedious to keep track of. An abstract "supply" system can be used for brevity:
• Characters may purchase and carry units of all-purpose supplies.
• Guesstimate how much an individual could carry. Strong characters might be able to carry more. Pack animals could carry many.
• When a specific piece of equipment is required, a player can reduce their supply by 1 to produce it from their pack. That item is now an actual object in their inventory.
• Once the party expends all their supplies, they'll have to deal with the consequences. Like starvation, or lack of torchlight in a dark dungeon, etc.
• Supply can deplete over time. Torches burn out. People need to eat.
• Strict time tracking is not necessary, just call it whenever it seems appropriate.
• eg. If a person needs ~2 meals a day, then supply drops by 2 per day, etc.

THE REFEREE GUIDE

Some things for Referee's to keep in mind when running a freeform or rules-lite game.

Be informative. Encourage questions about the world. Be direct and helpful with answers, and respond with information that can be acted upon as the players explore. Let them ask questions until they're satisfied and wish to proceed. If they need to be aware of something to make an informed decision, then offer the information freely.

Be honest and transparent. Justify your rulings. Explain why you ruled something the way you did. If you have to withhold information for the good of the game, then say so. Explain what a roll is for and what factors will play a part in your interpretation. 

Use logic, common sense and deductive reasoning. Or at least the internal logic of the fiction. Situations, actions and reactions should follow a path to their logical conclusion. The dice are not a substitute for this. 

Telegraph danger. Make it clear when a threat is dangerous. Especially if it's lethal. If a player's course of action would be foolish, then let them know and give them an opportunity to make a different decision. Let traps be easily discovered. The interesting part is how the players deal with them. 

Yes, and. If a player's suggestion sounds reasonable, then let it happen. Reward clever or compelling role-play by taking the ball and running with it. Give players opportunities to interact with the world as a real place and solve problems by any means they can come up with. The intended solution should never be the only one. 

The non-player characters are real people too. They have wants, needs, goals and motives. They react to the player characters accordingly. They have the same instinct for self preservation as any other living creature. They'll try to avoid fights they can't win, surrender, or run away.

Choices have consequences. Give players agency to have a real impact on the world around them. Sometimes this means immediate consequences. Sometimes it means far reaching ones that will affect them down the line. Don't lock them in to situations where only one course of action makes sense. Give them something to agonise and argue over.

Keep the game moving. If the players are having difficulty deciding on a course of action, then prompt them with A or B choices. If a ruling is contested, then be willing to compromise, or put your foot down and move on. If you do so, then allow further discussion between sessions to hash it out. Every mechanic you add to the game slows it down. Try to keep resolutions to a single die roll at most.

Steal. Harvest ideas from everywhere. Use random tables from the internet. If someone's done the work for you already, then use it. If you like a mechanic from another game, then use it.

Rule 0. The Referee is the rules. If a situation comes up and you find the basic 2d6 roll doesn't cut it, then make up a new rule that fits the situation and add it to your game. By doing it yourself, you're making only the rules that work for you and your table. Nothing wasted. Nothing in the way.

Keep it real. Know that every rule you add risks breaking immersion and the flow of play. Players start to think in "game logic" when interactions are turned in to mechanics. If you can simply rationalise something out within the fiction, then do so. As was said at the top: Don't let the rules get in the way of a good time.

Create situations rather than stories. Treat the game like a simulation. You set up all the moving pieces and watch how they react to player input. That generates the story all on it's own, in an organic way, where the players had direct input.

Give diegetic rewards. A $5 word that means "within the fiction". Let players accomplish their goals, amass wealth, glory and power. Character advancement happens within the fiction; warriors fight or train against worthy opponents. Wizards seek or research new spells. Warlocks make pacts with demons for more power. Pay attention to the needs and wants of the players, and provide opportunities to fulfil them.

You can do this. You and your players are capable of more creativity than you give yourself credit for. Your brains hold a lifetime worth of collected information that is instantly recalled when needed. That's why the "rules" here demand situational interpretation. It's so easy to do, it's subconscious.

Don't believe me? 

Orc Fighter. 

You already know what that character can do, don't you? You just know. You don't need pages of mechanised special abilities written out to know that an Orc Fighter can cleave through multiple foes in one swing. Or how to rule that situation in a way that is satisfying and fair. Those two words conjured the entire scenario in your head, played it out, solved it.

You can make logical, common sense rulings on anything, instantly. You also have several other people at the table capable of the same thing, and when we put our monkey brains together, we can come to even better conclusions.

Running a game in this way puts the role-playing first. You just describe things naturally and everything happens in a way that makes sense. The dice are a method of informing your decisions, not making them for you. They help when they're needed then recede so as not to get in the way.

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This shit is free or whatever. The mechanics and ideas aren't new. Just don't claim these words are your own, or try to make money off them.