I've never played any of the FFG RPGs but what I have gathered is they use special dice as part of their respective games. What do you think such a die to look like? Are we talking 6 sided? Maybe having rings on each side? I have no idea so what ideas do you have in mind?

If they continue along the path they are on now it will be the exact same dice we have in WFRPG, Star Wars and Genysis with different symbols.

That is of course assuming they will continue along the same path. I personally don't think a narrative dice system will work for Legend of the Five Rings since its really a more gritty game but we'll see. You know if you asked me 10 years ago if making a symbol/narrative dice system could work I would have laughed at you and today Edge of the Empire is among my favorite RPG's systems. So we'll have to wait and see.

3 hours ago, kpsmith said:

I've never played any of the FFG RPGs but what I have gathered is they use special dice as part of their respective games. What do you think such a die to look like? Are we talking 6 sided? Maybe having rings on each side? I have no idea so what ideas do you have in mind?

If it is the Genesys/Star Wars dice, there there are six types: a green eight-sided die called the ability die , a yellow twelve-sided die called the proficiency die , a light blue six-sided die called the boost die . These are the 'positive' die that characters roll, representing skills and strengths.

The negative dice are: a purple eight-sided die called the difficulty die , a red twelve-sided die called the challenge die , and a black six-sided die called the setback die .

To build a dice pool, you start with a skill. Let's use Survival. Each skill is tied with a characteristic, or attribute--Survival is tied to Cunning. Skills are numbered 0-5, and characteristics are numbered 1-6. The player or GM (depending on if its a PC or NPC) takes a number of ability dice equal to the greater of the two numbers then upgrades--or replaces--a number of those dice equal to the lower number with proficiency dice. If you had a Cunning of 4 and a Survival skill of 2, you'd start with 4 green ability dice and replace 2 of those dice with 2 yellow proficiency dice. It also works in reverse: if Survival was 4 and Cunning was 2, it would be the same dice pool described. If there are no ranks in a skill, you roll ability dice equal to the associated characteristic.

The GM will also set the difficulty, which indicates how many purple difficulty dice are rolled with the above dice. This goes: Simple (0) > easy (1) > average (2) > hard (3) > daunting (4) > formidable (5). It usually doesn't exceed 5. There are a few ways to upgrade the difficulty dice into challenge dice, the most common being the GM flipping a destiny point (Star Wars) or story point (Genesys).

The boost and setback dice are added as situational modifiers. It can be through the environment, being injured, having help, the gear being used, etc. In Star Wars, there are numerous talents (character abilities) that remove setback dice from certain skill checks, and there are a few that can add boost dice.

The player and GM can further modify the dice pool, such as removing setback dice or downgrading checks (i.e. removing the challenge/proficiency dice and replacing them with difficulty/ability dice).

A dice pool will look like this (in Star Wars; Genesys uses different symbols but matching colors):

2eA+1eP+2eD+1eC+1eB+1eS : 3 successes [2eA=A/A, S/A] [1eP=S/S] [2eD=Th, Th] [1eC=F/Th] [1eB=S/A] [1eS=Th]

So, the symbols work as follows: the ability die and the boost die have two types of symbols, called success (the star-like symbol) and advantage (the wing-like symbol). The proficiency die has both and a third symbol, called a triumph .

The difficulty die and the setback die include failures (the triangle symbol) and threat (the one that looks like a TIE fighter cockpit). The challenge die has both and a third symbol called despair , the counterpart to triumph.

When you roll a dice pool, you compare the numbers of success and failure. If you have at least 1 success more than failure, the check is successful. Generally, the published material uses an excess of success for certain effects, but not failures. Then you compare the advantage and threat--if there is an excess of advantage, a positive effect can happen, and if there is an excess of threat, a negative effect can happen. The more there are, the more complex the event.

Triumph and despair each count as a success and a failure, respectively. This can be cancelled like normal. But they also have their triumph and despair effects, which, under normal circumstances, cannot be cancelled, so you can have a successful check with triumph and despair, or vice versa. The effects of triumph and despair can be likened to a more extreme versions of advantage and threat; generally, the examples in the books likens a single triumph to 3-4 advantage, and can do anything that advantage can do, but there may be certain things only a triumph can do. Likewise for despair.

I will also point out that the dice generally favor success.

Of course, this is all moot if L5R doesn't use this system. We could be rolling potatoes for all we know.

I really pray to have something similar to the R&K, and I pray even more for the genesys system to be forgotten.

If this new game have the genesys system it's without me. Seriously, this system is a cancer. It take a TED conference to explain only how to launch the dices and read them.

I played a star wars campaign with 5 of my friends, huge star wars fans, the kind that pay 300$ for a simple lightsaber lamp. We played 3 seances and 4 of them cancelled their participation to this campaign because of the system.

I guess we'll see next week.

As someone who loves the narrative dice, currently running a SW campaign, and looking forward to Genesys - here's hoping L5R can go a completely different route. Making the same mechanic over and over simply gets boring, and bespeaks of a lack of ability and/or desire on the designers' part to come up with something new and exciting.

That said, I highly doubt they'll keep the R&K system. A shame. BUT, maybe some variation on it? Coriolis uses a d6 pool with 6s being "success." You need 1 success to succeed, and additional 6s can be used to succeed "better." So Maybe something along those lines, but using the traditional d10 of L5R (given there's a lot of veteran L5R players with faction-specific d10s). Wouldn't necessarily have to be 10s to succeed, though. They could do some mechanic where the success is static (e.g., 7+) with 10s equating to a bonus, and then your skill level determines the number of dice in the pool. Or there could be a sliding success rubric where your skill level determines your success rate (e.g., 10-minus-level, so a level 3 skill would succeed on a 7+).

Anxiously awaiting next week!

2 minutes ago, Farseerixirvost said:

Making the same mechanic over and over simply gets boring, and bespeaks of a lack of ability and/or desire on the designers' part to come up with something new and exciting.

And all those other game companies that have their own system that they use repeatedly are... what?

In my country, I played a game with a mechanic that make me happy to play. it's played with D6, but it's easily adaptable for other dices.

- you launch "skill's level" dices
- each dice under or equal to the characteristic is a success

the "1" are counted double

___________________________________________________

blackbird : white wolf, wizards of the coast, just for example.

Just now, Blackbird888 said:

And all those other game companies that have their own system that they use repeatedly are... what?

boring and repetitive.

The core mechanic may be cool and interesting compared to other companies' offerings, but when its just repeated in each "game" they put out, then here is the result - I may play one of them for the setting and to enjoy that mechanic, but beyond that, I prefer to have variety between my various RPG games, so said company is cutting off/down my dollar flow to them since my next investment will be in something different.

I agree with you with the boring side, but...

the mechanics don't do all of the game. it's not because a game use the same system as another game that the game isn't interesting. I'm someone with the deep desire to burry the genesys system. but, as a player the most important to me is the universe himself. If i can use a system smoothly (no genesys, stay away please), I can focus on the discovery of the universe.

on the other side, if you take time to understand the system more than discover the universe, it's not a good game.

_________________________________________

I don't know if you'll be receptive to my way of thinking, but where I live, i can see the differente philosophies between american games and french games (yes I'm french).

- all american games I know, it's a complete collection with 20 books minimum. each book contain some lore, but a lot of mechanics. it's system every pages.

- a lot of french games (not all) are composed with one book of rule and some lore, and 4~5 books with lore, sometimes some lines about mechanics.

Just to say, if you focus too much on the system, you forgot to live in the game.

Thanks for that description @Blackbird888 that sounds like a decent system. My main concern is dice with blank sides. Nothing frustrates me more than rolling 8 dice and only getting 1-2 success, or worse none. With a numerical system you get a total gradient of success, so that even a roll of a 1 could be what helps you succeed at your check. I assume the "good" dice are just blanks and successes and the "bad" dice are blanks and failures... This is kinda what I'm worried about. The Arkham board game and Super Dungeon Explorers turned me off by having blank sides on the dice. It just gives chance too much room to play out. I've lost games and characters because I roll nearly a handful of dice and get no successes.

Although I'm skeptical I'm willing to give whatever L5R gets a try.

In RNK you can roll 1 1 1 1 1 too. Or 10 10 10 10 10 on damage against you.

50 minutes ago, shosuko said:

Thanks for that description @Blackbird888 that sounds like a decent system. My main concern is dice with blank sides. Nothing frustrates me more than rolling 8 dice and only getting 1-2 success, or worse none. With a numerical system you get a total gradient of success, so that even a roll of a 1 could be what helps you succeed at your check. I assume the "good" dice are just blanks and successes and the "bad" dice are blanks and failures... This is kinda what I'm worried about. The Arkham board game and Super Dungeon Explorers turned me off by having blank sides on the dice. It just gives chance too much room to play out. I've lost games and characters because I roll nearly a handful of dice and get no successes.

Although I'm skeptical I'm willing to give whatever L5R gets a try.

I don't know the exact mathematical probabilities (there are threads about it somewhere), but both d8s have a 1/8 chance to roll a blank, both d12s have a 1/12 chance for blank, and both d6s have a 1/3 chance for blank. So while possible to roll blanks on all dice, the more you add, the less likely it can happen.

Personally, I use a total set of blanks or a totally neutral roll as a chance to throw in some humor, but that's just me. I call it a Magikarp roll.

5 hours ago, daruthin said:

and I pray even more for the genesys system to be forgotten.

Unlikely, since Genesys has yet to be released and they've had massive success with it's foundation in the Star Wars game.

I'm expecting it to be based on the Genesys/Star Wars dice, but with a major overhaul. I always liked how Savage Worlds was a pretty simple system that you could port easily from one setting to another, but I don't feel like FFG works that way. Any Schmoe with the Genesys book could say, "I'd like to throw together a Legend of the Five Rings conversion for this system." Drop one of the six base attributes, associate the remaining ones with an elemental Ring, reassign skills, link a few talents to certain clans, and work out some signature spells. That right there would make a perfectly acceptable L5R conversion.

But I really don't think they're going to publish a book with a conversion that I could do in a week. And if you read the description, it doesn't sound like they are. I'm thinking Advantage, Triumph, Threat and Despair will mean something entirely different. Who knows what they're doing with the Schools? But I guess we'll get a lot of answers in a week. I, for one, hope they keep the Narrative Dice, as they've grown on me.

You guys are cute.

We all know it's gonna be poker hand driven like the alternate rules for the Deadlands RPG. That's the future of gaming.

6 hours ago, daruthin said:

I agree with you with the boring side, but...

the mechanics don't do all of the game. it's not because a game use the same system as another game that the game isn't interesting. I'm someone with the deep desire to burry the genesys system. but, as a player the most important to me is the universe himself. If i can use a system smoothly (no genesys, stay away please), I can focus on the discovery of the universe.

on the other side, if you take time to understand the system more than discover the universe, it's not a good game.

_________________________________________

I don't know if you'll be receptive to my way of thinking, but where I live, i can see the differente philosophies between american games and french games (yes I'm french).

- all american games I know, it's a complete collection with 20 books minimum. each book contain some lore, but a lot of mechanics. it's system every pages.

- a lot of french games (not all) are composed with one book of rule and some lore, and 4~5 books with lore, sometimes some lines about mechanics.

Just to say, if you focus too much on the system, you forgot to live in the game.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not loosing sight of the forest for the trees here, I'm just talking to the specific topic of this post - dice mechanics. But for me personally, for a game to be appealing, it has to have a kick *** universe setting AND a fun set of mechanics underlying it. To me, there is not one without the other. If I don't like the universe setting, I'm out; if I do not like the mechanics of the game, I'm out.

I won't say I'm as familiar with American vs. French/Euro/Non-American games (although I do own a few dozen different systems/settings), but it seems like most mainstream RPGs* live on a system of Core Book (or maybe core books plural) and then a bunch of extra books. The extra books add more detail and more options, both in the setting sense as well as mechanical sense, but ARE NOT NECESSARY. Take away every Star Wars RPG book except the core book(s) - game is still 100% playable. Take away all the non Players Handbook, DM Guide, and Monster Manual books from D&D and the game is still 100% playable.

* I say "mainstream RPGs" meaning that super-indie producers often don't have the wherewithal to pump out splat books, so those releases don't follow the core + supplements quite to the extreme.

All that said, to bring this discussion back to the OP question of what do we expect/think for future L5R dice - I just don't get the gut feeling we're in for a pure Genesys/Narrative Dice mechanic. I feel that if it was tied to that, FFG would have said so.

1 hour ago, The Grand Falloon said:

I'm expecting it to be based on the Genesys/Star Wars dice, but with a major overhaul.

Certainly possible (but then again, so is "rolling potatoes" as suggested above by @Blackbird888 ). My gut feeling is that we'll probably end up with something closer to this than, say, something that uses "normal" dice with numbers. But it won't be a pure SW/Genesys portage with different symbols.

In fact, here's my bold guess - the dice system will be narrative, will feature symbols and not numbers, BUT symbology will somehow tie into the Five Rings such that (for example) doing "water" things and rolling "water symbols" will mean something more than simply rolling success/failure and advantage/threat.

At least that's my best guess after a couple days of thinking about it.

I've enjoyed the star wars game for star wars. But my tastes for the L5R setting would go towards a more descriptive set of mechanics. I love Ars Magica where when you cast a spell; you're incorporating information about the character's study of two or more magical arts, their stamina, their relevant work in their laboratory, their study of the art of penetrating magic resistance, the magical influence of where they are standing and (chances are) one or two relevant virtues and flaws. In Ars Magica spending experience points is tied so tightly to the character's history that you can accurately recreate most of a character sheet by looking at the books a character has read and the list of laboratory notes they've created.

The new L5R need not be that descriptive but a little finer grained than the new star wars would make me happy.

I think if it was gonna be a straight Genesys conversion we would know about that already based on the news we've gotten. I suspect it will be different, but I also suspect it will be custom dice. I'm sort of hoping it's custom dice based on each element. I think that would be neat. I do want something different than R&K because we have lots of R&K already. If it is R&K I hope they make enough changes to make it worth wild to check out. Otherwise why not just buy all the old R&K books FFG made available already digitally.

Also keep in mind that it's a beta they are announcing so your feedback can make a difference. If you think the game needs work then participate and send feedback. Apparently they are responsive to feedback during these beta testing periods.

32 minutes ago, phillos said:

Also keep in mind that it's a beta they are announcing so your feedback can make a difference. If you think the game needs work then participate and send feedback. Apparently they are responsive to feedback during these beta testing periods.

I always wonder how much feedback really plays into betas. I've participated in several video game betas where it's essentially an early release with missing features, and nothing changed from there to launch except the missing features were added. Some developers know what they want, and if FFG knows what they want then we'll just have small changes to look forward to. The main hopes I have is that, regardless of dice mechanics, there is a social system that reasonably mirrors the combat system for player engagement. I really hope it is either well flushed out, or they listen to feedback to help it reach something very usable for non-rpg players to be able to participate in the social aspects of the game.

idk what SW has because I'm not a fan - does it have anything for mental stress? I liked what FATE had for wounds tracking. In my L5R group I'm looking to simply mirror the physical wounds as mental wounds (using willpower instead of stamina of course.) I like the idea of the mental state of a character being meaningful along with their physical state.

My bet is a narrative dice system but not the Genesys system.

My expectation is a system with 5 characteristics, one for each element. There would be elemental dice that you roll when making a check. Symbols would include success, advantage and a 5 Rings symbol which counts as a success but also allows you to pull off some awesome moves based upon the element your using for the action.

Skill training would add Upgrade the elemental Dice in the pool and there would be the equivalent of a Boost die that's used for advantageous situations.

Negative dice are Difficulty, Challenge dice, and equivalent of a Setback that are used for negative effects.

The major difference though that i think we could see is no one skill being tied to an element. The player chooses what elemental ring to use each check based on how their character is approaching the situation. The GM then sets an appropriate difficulty based on that selection.

eg a PC is sneaking past guards, and desperately needs to succeed quickly, being strong in Fire they try a brash and creative approach. The GM decides its risky so upgrades the check a couple of times.

My ideal system:

An Elemental die with positive success and advantage on them, but also a negative effect that triggers a themed effect based on the element.

Void may cause a delay to represent your patience slowing down your actions. Fire may cause you Strain as your brash and it's costing you effort (to use Genesys terminology). Earth perhaps causes you to loose honour as your overly stubborn actions are seen negatively by others. Air could cause problems for others in the form of Setback dice as your overly rushed actions get in their way. Water... idk!

But the important part of this system is the Players choice. When making a check they can use as many dice of a single element as they want, up to the maximum of rating their character. With the negative effects on the dice it becomes a trade off. An easy task could be effortless if the character puts 4 or 5 dice into the action... but they are more likely to have a negative effect happen.

I would still keep 2 types of negative dice, and a situational positive dice, bringing the total up to 4 types of dice.

7 minutes ago, shosuko said:

idk what SW has because I'm not a fan - does it have anything for mental stress? I liked what FATE had for wounds tracking. In my L5R group I'm looking to simply mirror the physical wounds as mental wounds (using willpower instead of stamina of course.) I like the idea of the mental state of a character being meaningful along with their physical state.

My feeble knowledge of SW system knows there is a second stat that is basically just straight "Stress" that you take hits to for pushing yourself too hard, or other effects. But I don't know that it is a straight HP like stat.

54 minutes ago, shosuko said:

I always wonder how much feedback really plays into betas. I've participated in several video game betas where it's essentially an early release with missing features, and nothing changed from there to launch except the missing features were added. Some developers know what they want, and if FFG knows what they want then we'll just have small changes to look forward to. The main hopes I have is that, regardless of dice mechanics, there is a social system that reasonably mirrors the combat system for player engagement. I really hope it is either well flushed out, or they listen to feedback to help it reach something very usable for non-rpg players to be able to participate in the social aspects of the game.

I had that question about FFG in particular because I never participated in an FFG beta and I was assured by several people that large changes have come out of their beta playtest program in the past.

41 minutes ago, shosuko said:

I always wonder how much feedback really plays into betas. I've participated in several video game betas where it's essentially an early release with missing features, and nothing changed from there to launch except the missing features were added. Some developers know what they want, and if FFG knows what they want then we'll just have small changes to look forward to. The main hopes I have is that, regardless of dice mechanics, there is a social system that reasonably mirrors the combat system for player engagement. I really hope it is either well flushed out, or they listen to feedback to help it reach something very usable for non-rpg players to be able to participate in the social aspects of the game.

The trick with video game betas is that they usually aren't testing the base game, but the servers. This is especially true for multiplayer games (which, surprise, are pretty much the only ones that get betas).

43 minutes ago, shosuko said:

idk what SW has because I'm not a fan - does it have anything for mental stress? I liked what FATE had for wounds tracking. In my L5R group I'm looking to simply mirror the physical wounds as mental wounds (using willpower instead of stamina of course.) I like the idea of the mental state of a character being meaningful along with their physical state.

There are wounds, strain, and critical injuries.

You wound threshold is like your physical stamina; how much punishment a character's body can withstand before they break. Exceeding wound threshold incapacitates a character and inflicts 1 critical injury.

Critical injuries can stack, with every one you have increasing the severity of the next. If you continue to take wounds after being incapacitated, you take more and more injuries until death. You can also take a critical injury from a weapon or by falling and so on.

Your strain threshold is like your mental stamina. In Star Wars, strain is the non-lethal stunning damage. Strain is easy to take (threat on a dice roll can inflict strain) but just as easy to recover (advantage on a dice roll can be spent to recover it). Exceeding your threshold incapacitates you, but you don't take any critical injuries. Strain is also a resource, so you can voluntarily suffer strain to get extra maneuvers in a round, or to trigger an ability, among other things.

RE: Social -- Star Wars does have a pretty good handle on social encounters, I think. The dice are pretty well adapted for it, and I can think of at least three Star Wars sourcebooks where they discussed using the rules. At the least, there are individuals within FFG that are aware of social stuff, and are willing to develop it.

Quote

Custom dice mechanics enable players to contribute to the unfolding story and decide whether their character succeeds, by how much, and how much it will cost them.

That's pretty much all they say, but I think plain old Roll and Keep is out, simply by mention custom dice, and I doubt any amount of feedback will make them change a core mechanic.

That said, I do enjoy a bit of speculation for the fun of it, so here's a theory on how the could do custom dice without deviating too much from the original system... The custom dice have Successes, which you need to do the thing (so far so Star Wars), Raises, just like previous incarnations of L5R they let you do cool stuff, and Opportunities. Opportunities address the honor of a samurai and the part where they say "how much it will cost them", because an Opportunity is a chance for you to buy more Successes or Raises by losing honor or increasing your odds of losing honor, however they decide to have it work. Basically, Opportunities are chances to get ahead by not following Bushido.

2 hours ago, MuttonchopMac said:

That's pretty much all they say, but I think plain old Roll and Keep is out, simply by mention custom dice, and I doubt any amount of feedback will make them change a core mechanic.

That said, I do enjoy a bit of speculation for the fun of it, so here's a theory on how the could do custom dice without deviating too much from the original system... The custom dice have Successes, which you need to do the thing (so far so Star Wars), Raises, just like previous incarnations of L5R they let you do cool stuff, and Opportunities. Opportunities address the honor of a samurai and the part where they say "how much it will cost them", because an Opportunity is a chance for you to buy more Successes or Raises by losing honor or increasing your odds of losing honor, however they decide to have it work. Basically, Opportunities are chances to get ahead by not following Bushido.

Quote

Custom dice mechanics enable players to contribute to the unfolding story and decide whether their character succeeds, by how much, and how much it will cost them

I keep coming back to FFG's statement. "Custom Dice Mechanics" /= "Custom Dice."

In essence most RPGs have a custom dice mechanic. Some may be permutations on others. And some (particularly with open license) may be used over and over again. D&D and Savage Worlds both use the same kind of dice, but the mechanics are different.

Another thing I'm starting to think is, if it was going to use Genesys, then why the beta test? That's a fairly set in stone system that has proven to be successful.

So yeah, I think I'll stop thinking about it and just see what's up in the beta come next week.

2 minutes ago, Farseerixirvost said:

Another thing I'm starting to think is, if it was going to use Genesys, then why the beta test? That's a fairly set in stone system that has proven to be successful.

Don't forget that there's more to Star Wars/Genesys than just the dice. Primarily, I'm thinking about how characters are created, and how they grow.

Say what you will, but the base concept of three positive dice and three negative dice, with three positive symbols and three negative symbols, is pretty straightforward. The average person has more than enough fingers and toes to keep track of that.

Interpreting is pretty much setting agnostic. Success with threat? You successfully jumped over the gap, but dropped something. Failure with triumph? The culprit got away, but he left behind a clue. Is that Star Wars, or James Bond, or L5R? It could be any.

The thing is, Star Wars uses a loose class based system for character creation and development. If I started as a Colonist, it is cheaper to purchase only Colonist stuff, but I am not restricted to purchasing any other career, I just have to pay a bit extra. Class based, but pretty free form.

But from what little I do know of L5R as a setting, it wouldn't make much sense for the same thing to happen, right? While not impossible, it wouldn't be normal for a character of one clan to step over and pick up something from another rival clan just because that's where the player wanted to go. Especially as some people are pretty married to their clan of choice.

Genesys uses a variation of the Star Wars character creation, which has already gone through a beta--the most they need to do is put it through private play-testing.

But developing a whole new character creation process sounds like beta test material to me, especially with such a storied past as L5R.