Hello, this is my first post here so might as well clear some things upfront. I am a tabletop player who has seen quite a few systems over my ten years spent with the hobby, and have finally decided to perhaps brew some of my own. I got into OSR a couple of years ago when the style of playing grabbed my interest, and am now trying to create something inspired by it.
ASOS, or "Abstract Stats Old School" system, is a small project I have been thinking about some time. It follows most of the design philosophies set by OSR games, with a couple of unique twist thrown in.
The general design rules when I started thinking about ASOS were:
-The system should make rulings easy and natural
-It should allow for weird things to happen to the characters (transformations, curses, mutation)
-Allow for freedom of choice and action on players part
-Allow for fluid experience without tables that need constant referencing
-Make the system conversion friendly
Some works I took inspiration from include GLOG, DCC, D&D, FATE and the blog of Sheep&Sorcery.
ASOS resolution
Higher is better rolls with d20, this is kinda basic but that's how I roll. I know a lot of systems which like to use descending AC or rolling under skills, but at the same you try to roll as high as possible on some other rolls, like damage. For the sake of simplicity ASOS uses ascending AC and high rolls.
Basic Mechanics
Every character has 3 different stats which are divided to physical and mental, resulting into a total of six stats. The idea behind these stats was to tie each of them into a different way of resolving a situation. These stats are:
-Fire: Resolving a conflict with direct, offensive action. This includes most attack rolls, intimidation, seduction to some decree, knocking open doors and breaking stuff. Climbing, swimming and other direct movement based checks are from physical fire. You gain your physical fire modifier as a bonus to your hit rolls and your mental fire modifier as a bonus to your spell attacks.
-Water: Resolving a conflict by avoiding it, or by dealing with it indirectly. This includes dodging, sneaking, lying, most acrobatic checks and persuasion. Physical water also includes lock picking, while mental water has forgery and disguises. You gain your physical water modifier as a bonus to AC and your mental water modifier as an initiative bonus.
-Earth: Resolving a conflict by withstanding, outlasting or weathering it. This includes mostly taking hits and having a lasting memory, you can also use it to stand your ground, either in arguments or physically, this also includes balance. Perception checks are also rolled from mental metal. You gain your physical metal as a bonus to your HP and inventory slots, and your mental metal determines your amount of starting skills.
When your stats are abstract, instead of being physical and mental traits, it makes the resolution more sensible as you simply have to think about the way the players are trying to resolve conflict. Athletics and other gymnastic activities are one of the few things that do not fall into these categories, but those can be resolved with Physical Water. Otherwise you simply need to think about the resolution itself. Is the player trying to bride a guard? That's a mental water check. Are they trying to prevent someone from getting out of the room by standing in the doorway? Physical metal seems like the roll to make.
Stats are initially rolled with a 3d6 on character creation and modifier is equal to; (stat / 2, rounded down) - 5. Basically the same as in most editions of D&D. There are a couple of ways you can generate your stats however.
Most basic ways are just rolling 6 stats straight, or assigning them manually. You can also however roll only 3 stats straight, those being your physical stats. When you roll only your physical stats, your mental stats are reversed from your physical stats (3 becomes 18, 9 becomes 12 and so on). This makes every character be a 0 total character. Afterwards you may switch the stats around if so desired.
All of these approaches are valid and they honestly depend on the type of group you are playing with, and the GM who runs the game. Take an approach you find the most appealing for you and your group.
For conversion purposes, these stats translate as follows; Physical Fire = Strength, Physical Water = Dex, Physical Metal = Con, Mental Fire = Charisma/Personality*, Mental Water = Wisdom/Luck*, Mental Metal = Intelligence.
These stat conversions are mostly meant for determining what type of stat damage certain abilities and monsters deal. If you are converting abilities or classes from other systems, you should think how the abilities convert to these new stats and which suit them the best.
*For DCC conversions
Saves are linked to the three stats, which means you have Fire, Water and Metal save. They go as follows:
-Fire Save: Resisting emotional control, binding and generic spell effects, this is the will save in most systems.
-Water Save: Avoiding attacks, dodging those fireballs and jumping over the traps, this is the reflex save in most systems.
-Metal Save: Withstanding attacks, resisting that disintegration, being turned to stone or ghoul paralysis. Poisons and disease also fall under metal save. This is the constitution save in most systems.
Your base save is equal to the combined modifiers from the corresponding stats, so your metal save is equal to your mental and physical metal modifier for example. This might give some players fairly high or low base saves, but if you are rolling the stats linked, then your base saves are 0, unless you go around switching stats.
Skills
Skills are determined by your mental metal and your advancement. They are strictly non-combat and are usually stuff like metalworking or woodworking. You can also buy languages as skills in addition to those your character knows from his race or class. Skills are added as a bonus to any skill based roll, instead of stats. I will touch upon them further once I have completed working on the advancement system for the game.
Other Stats
The game uses attack bonus, initiative, AC and HP, in addition to these characters have a set amount of inventory slots depending on their physical metal, with larger items taking more slots. Attacks are divided to spell attacks, melee attacks and ranged attacks, but all of them gain your class/advancement based attack bonus to them in addition to stat bonuses. Physical attacks come from physical fire and magical attacks from mental fire. HP is more "don't get hit points", meaning that they are easily recovered, but wounds you gain last a long time. HP totals will overall stay under 30 hit points meaning that combat will be dangerous no matter your advancements, barring maybe the most ridiculous characters.
Character Motivations
These are concepts that motivate your character, you can choose them at any point during play, but they only grant you advantages after you have chosen them and acted upon them. They are similar to core concepts in FATE and convictions in GLOG. They are the reason why your character is out there looting dungeons and gaining fame. Usually motivations tell why the character adventures, what guides them or what they seek to gain. Common motivators can be greed, sense of honor or vengeance. They should be max 3-5 words and give a good idea of the motivator.
Whenever a character acts upon the motivator, they gain a motivation point for that motivator, a character can have max 1 point per motivator, barring some special cases. This motivation point can be used for a +4 bonus on an action related to that motivation. The GM decides which actions warrant these points or where they can be used, but usually this should involve danger, risk or loss that the character would not experience unless they were acting on the motivator. The players can also choose to roll if they act on a motivator, but this is not mandatory and can be done by the player without asking.
When a player has a point of motivation that is unspent and comes up with a situation that is related to that motivation, the GM may require that you roll a mental metal roll against a fitting difficulty, unless you act upon that motivation. If you do not act upon the motivation and fail the metal roll, you lose that motivation point. This can be done to pressure characters into spending their motivation, and should not be done if the players are actively acting on their motivations and spending the points.
Characters can have up to three different motivations. You can start the play with none, but I suggest you'd get most players to pick at least one. The second and third motivation slot can be filled when they have a better idea about their character.
Cool Combat Stunts
WIP at the moment. They will be derived from physical water however, as they are more indirect ways of attacking. Resisting stunts will be made with physical metal, or some other stat if it's more appropriate. Stunts are one of the few mechanics where both the one taking the action and the target roll.
Critical Hits and Fumbles During Combat
These happen when you roll a natural 20 or natural 1 respectively, but only if you have a bonus or penalty to the attack. If you roll a natural 20 without a bonus, you simply give the next guy to attack the target a +4 to their attack (your attack creates an opening for them), and hit the enemy regardless of their AC. If you have any kind of bonus outside of stats and attack bonus however, your attack is a critical hit, and is rolled from the critical table. If you instead roll a natural 1 you expose your defenses, giving the next foe to strike you a +4. Rolling a natural 1 when you have any kind of penalty to your attacks causes a fumble, which is rolled from the fumble table. Combat stunts can also fumble and crit, but unless the fumble or crit makes sense, just give the one rolling 1 or 20 a penalty or bonus to the next attack they receive/make.
Terminology for future reference (even if I did not use most of them here)
GM = Game Master
P = Physical
M = Mental
Fire = Fire
Wat = Water
Met = metal
So PFire would be Physical Fire and MMEt would be Mental Metal for example.
TLDR about basics
The system core looks similar to basically every other OSR system there is, but you need to think about it differently. You are not thinking whether a problem requires strength or dexterity to solve, but rather you are asking yourself if the conflict resolution is aggressive, avoiding or withstanding. This abstraction is mostly meant to ease situations where conventional stats might not be applicable. Since stats and saves also have some resemblance to the classic varieties, conversion should be easy and painless.
