FUDGE Cabal
Dec. 24th, 2001 05:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bryantThe following covers character creation. It does not cover the FUDGE Cabal magic system. I.e., I've done the easy part.
Comments are welcome.
Background
FUDGE Cabal is a setting based on GURPS Cabal, but without all the nasty GURPS stuff. The time is present-day; the world is one of global conspiracies revolving around the secrets of hermetic magic. PCs begin blissfully unaware of all of this.
Character Creation
Rankings
FUDGE ranks everything on a seven point scale. From worst to best: Terrible, Poor, Mediocre, Fair, Good, Great, Superb.
Attributes
FUDGE Cabal uses four attributes. They are:
Strength: you know what this is.
Agility: you know what this is too.
Will: strength of will; relevant for weird stuff as well as general stubbornness, charisma, etc.
Intelligence: smarts.
All attributes start at Fair. You may raise any two attributes by one rank or raise one attribute by two ranks for free. You may also raise any attribute by one rank at the price of dropping another attribute by one rank. You can not drop any attribute below Poor. You will regret having a very low Will.
Skills
Here's the skill list. These are very general skills, as per Feng Shui. For example, Guns covers firing a gun, repairing a gun, knowing who the great gunmen of the world are, and so on.
Info and Profession are both skill classes -- if you take either of these, you'll also define what it covers. I.e., Info (Egyptian Mythology) or Profession (Egyptologist). Profession is generally better than Info, since it incorporates the corresponding Info skill.
Weaponry covers hand to hand weaponry; skill in Martial Arts does not translate into skill with (say) a rapier.
In some cases, Profession skills may replace skills listed below. For example, Profession (Doctor) incorporates Medicine; Profession (Detective) incorporates Detective. The one you pick depends on your character concept. A ballerina who knew how to sew people up would take Medicine; a doctor would take Profession (Doctor).
Skills default to Poor, except those marked with a *, which default to Terrible.
Athletics
Deception
Detective
Driving
*Guns
*Info
Intimidation
Intrusion
Leadership
*Martial Arts
*Medicine
*Profession
*Science
Seduction
Technology
*Weaponry
You have fifteen points to spend on skills. Costs are as follows:
Terrible -1
Poor 0
Mediocre 1
Fair 2
Good 3
Great 4
Superb 5
If you spend a point on a skill that defaults to Terrible, it still becomes Mediocre. It's assumed that any degree of training will bring you from Terrible to Mediocre.
You can buy two Info skills for the price of one. I.e., for one point, you can buy both Info (Pro Sports) and Info (Chinese Literature).
You may also drop a skill to Terrible (if it isn't already there) to raise another skill by one level.
You may have no more than one Superb skill at character creation.
Gifts
Gifts are things about the character that aren't skills or attributes. A bunch of Gifts are listed here; these are not the only possible Gifts. Talk to the GM if you want to make up a different Gift.
Note that most of these contain no game mechanics. This is on purpose; the reasons will become clearer when you read about combat.
You may start with two Gifts.
Absolute Direction: you can always determine which way you're facing, and you have a good memory for retracing your steps.
Ambidextrous: you are equally capable with either hand, and in fact can do two things at once (albeit not quite as well as you could do either alone).
Animal Empathy: animals like you.
Contacts: you have contacts in a specific area, who'll help you out in most situations.
Danger Sense: the hairs on the back of your neck quiver when danger is close. You are rarely surprised.
Healthy: you recover from wounds a week faster than you otherwise would, but at a minimum of four days (without medical help) or two days (with medical help).
Lucid Dreaming: you have mastered the techniques of lucid dreaming. This does not appear to offer much of an advantage in life.
Lucky: you gain an extra Fudge Point per session, which cannot be used for character advancement.
Keen Hearing: you can hear soft-pitched whispers from a fair distance; your hearing also has a range a bit outside the human norm.
Quick Reflexes: you react much more quickly than the average bear.
Night Vision: you can see very well in the dark. This isn't infravision; you can't see in absolute darkness and it's not as if you can make out facial details at 60 yards on a moonlit night. But you can pick out people trying to hide in shadows and such.
Reputation: you have a reputation of your choosing (presumably a good one) in a specific field (probably your own).
Single-minded: you get +1 to any extended task roll.
Wealth: you are very well-off. Buy it twice, and you can be rich.
Code of Honor is a special form of Gift. You may take it as a third Gift if you like. You may also pick it up during the campaign at no cost. It provides an advantage in some situations, particularly when resisting outside influences; however, it's a disadvantage in situations where the player really wants the character to act contrary to the code.
How It Works
Task Resolution
FUDGE uses FUDGE dice. FUDGE dice have two 1s, two -1s, and two 0s on 'em. To use a skill, you roll 4 FUDGE dice, resulting in a number between -4 and 4. You move that many steps up or down the ranking ladder; that's the degree of success.
Example: you have Good Science. You roll 4dF, and get a +2. You achieve a Superb success.
Different tasks will have different difficulty levels. If, in the previous example, you were trying to calculate the amount of force you'd need to launch a rocket out of the Earth's gravity well, that'd be pretty simple; you'd only need, say, a Mediocre result. If you were trying to figure out a new theory to account for the effect of vampiric blood on mice, you'd need a Great result.
Opposed actions are just like normal actions, except that each party rolls two FUDGE dice, modifies their skills by the result, and compares outcomes. The high outcome determines the relative degree of success or failure.
Example: you have Fair Seduction. You attempt to seduce the German scientist. You get a +1 and a 0 on your dice, which pushes your Seduction attempt up to a Good. The scientist has Fair Will, and rolls a -1 and a 0. That drops his Will result to a Mediocre. You succeed in your seduction attempt.
If the scientist was suspicious -- perhaps his boss told him there was a cute spy around -- he might have gotten a +1 or +2 to his roll. It wouldn't have gotten him a successful resist, but he might have been less prone to falling asleep afterwards, which would make it more difficult for you to steal his research notes.
Combat
FUDGE Cabal uses story element combat. This is a fairly loose style of combat resolution; if it doesn't work we may revert back to something more rigorous.
In story element combat, the GM explains the situation in as much detail as is apparent, then asks the players to describe what their characters are doing. The more complete the description of their characters' actions, the better the GM know how to assess the situation. This can be important if she has something that won't be revealed until the middle of a battle. Die rolls are required by the GM for each story element.
A story element is the smallest unit of time in this type of combat resolution. The GM may break the battle down into several story elements, or treat the whole encounter as one element. This depends on the GM's style, the importance of the battle, the number of participants, whether or not there are unexpected surprises, etc. Each element should be a dramatic unit.
Damage
Wounds are assigned as appropriate, by the GM. The GM may ask for a damage roll in appropriate situations. Mooks and thugs are likely to go down quickly, without damage rolls; important NPCs are more likely to rack up damage as a PC would. Damage rolls are simply 1 FUDGE die, with the result (-1 to +1) indicating whether the weapon does more, less, or about the same amount of damage one would expect. (Brass knucks usually won't kill a man in one shot; an Uzi might.)
Wound levels are:
Undamaged: no wounds at all.
Just A Scratch: no real game effect, except to create tension. This may eventually lead to being Hurt if the character is hit again.
Hurt: the character is wounded significantly, enough to slow him down. Take a -1 to all rolls which would logically be affected.
Very Hurt: the character is seriously hurt, possibly stumbling. Take -2 to all rolls which would logically be affected.
Incapacitated: the character is so badly wounded as to be incapable of any actions, except possibly dragging himself a few feet every now and then or gasping out an important message.
Near Death: the character is not only unconscious, he'll die in less than an hour -- maybe a lot less -- without medical help. No one recovers from Near Death on their own unless very lucky.
Dead: he has no more use for his possessions, unless he belongs to a culture that believes he'll need them in the afterlife.
Wound levels may be either subdual or lethal, since this is a fairly cinematic campaign.
Healing
A Scratch is too insignificant to require healing. Scratches are usually erased after a battle, provided the characters have five or ten minutes to attend to them.
A Good result on Medicine heals all wounds one level (Hurt to healed, Very Hurt to Hurt, and so on). Scratches do not count as a level for healing purposes. That is, a Hurt wound that is healed one level is fully healed. A Great result heals you two levels, and a Superb result heals three levels. However, the doctor must have access to appropriate medical supplies.
Healing with Medicine also takes time: the success of the roll merely insures the wounds will heal, given enough rest. Generally speaking, after medical attention you'll heal at the rate of one wound level per three days of rest.
Otherwise, wounds heal on their own at one wound level per week of rest. That is, after a week of rest, an Incapacitated character becomes Very Hurt, etc.
Someone Near Death takes a long time to heal, even with magical or high tech healing.
Character Advancement & Fudge Points
The GM will award 1 to 3 Fudge Points per session. You may spend these as follows:
From To Costs
Terrible Poor 1 FP
Poor Mediocre 1 FP
Mediocre Fair 1 FP
Fair Good 2 FP
Good Great 4 FP
Great Superb 8 FP
Superb Legendary 16 FP + GM permission
("Hey, what's that Legendary stuff?" "Never you mind.")
Raising an attribute costs triple the cost for skills of the same level. Adding a gift costs 6 FP (or more) + GM approval.
You may also use one Fudge Point to do any of the following things:
Spend one Fudge Point to alter a die roll one level, up or down as desired. The die roll can be either one the player makes, or one the GM makes that directly concerns the player's character.
Spend one Fudge Point to declare that wounds aren't as bad as they first looked. This reduces the intensity of each wound by one or two levels (a Hurt result becomes a Scratch, for example, or even a Very Hurt becomes a Scratch).
Spend a GM-set number of Fudge Points to ensure a favorable coincidence, subject to GM veto. For example, if the PCs are in a maximum security prison, perhaps one of the guards turns out to be the cousin of one of the PCs! The player outlines the desired coincidence, and the GM decides how many points it will cost. (Probably just one, but you never know.)
Other Stuff
There are no rules for magic, psionics, or other weirdness in this guide. That's on purpose. This should not be taken to mean that PCs will never be able to use magic, psionics, or other weirdness.
Comments are welcome.
Background
FUDGE Cabal is a setting based on GURPS Cabal, but without all the nasty GURPS stuff. The time is present-day; the world is one of global conspiracies revolving around the secrets of hermetic magic. PCs begin blissfully unaware of all of this.
Character Creation
Rankings
FUDGE ranks everything on a seven point scale. From worst to best: Terrible, Poor, Mediocre, Fair, Good, Great, Superb.
Attributes
FUDGE Cabal uses four attributes. They are:
Strength: you know what this is.
Agility: you know what this is too.
Will: strength of will; relevant for weird stuff as well as general stubbornness, charisma, etc.
Intelligence: smarts.
All attributes start at Fair. You may raise any two attributes by one rank or raise one attribute by two ranks for free. You may also raise any attribute by one rank at the price of dropping another attribute by one rank. You can not drop any attribute below Poor. You will regret having a very low Will.
Skills
Here's the skill list. These are very general skills, as per Feng Shui. For example, Guns covers firing a gun, repairing a gun, knowing who the great gunmen of the world are, and so on.
Info and Profession are both skill classes -- if you take either of these, you'll also define what it covers. I.e., Info (Egyptian Mythology) or Profession (Egyptologist). Profession is generally better than Info, since it incorporates the corresponding Info skill.
Weaponry covers hand to hand weaponry; skill in Martial Arts does not translate into skill with (say) a rapier.
In some cases, Profession skills may replace skills listed below. For example, Profession (Doctor) incorporates Medicine; Profession (Detective) incorporates Detective. The one you pick depends on your character concept. A ballerina who knew how to sew people up would take Medicine; a doctor would take Profession (Doctor).
Skills default to Poor, except those marked with a *, which default to Terrible.
Athletics
Deception
Detective
Driving
*Guns
*Info
Intimidation
Intrusion
Leadership
*Martial Arts
*Medicine
*Profession
*Science
Seduction
Technology
*Weaponry
You have fifteen points to spend on skills. Costs are as follows:
Terrible -1
Poor 0
Mediocre 1
Fair 2
Good 3
Great 4
Superb 5
If you spend a point on a skill that defaults to Terrible, it still becomes Mediocre. It's assumed that any degree of training will bring you from Terrible to Mediocre.
You can buy two Info skills for the price of one. I.e., for one point, you can buy both Info (Pro Sports) and Info (Chinese Literature).
You may also drop a skill to Terrible (if it isn't already there) to raise another skill by one level.
You may have no more than one Superb skill at character creation.
Gifts
Gifts are things about the character that aren't skills or attributes. A bunch of Gifts are listed here; these are not the only possible Gifts. Talk to the GM if you want to make up a different Gift.
Note that most of these contain no game mechanics. This is on purpose; the reasons will become clearer when you read about combat.
You may start with two Gifts.
Absolute Direction: you can always determine which way you're facing, and you have a good memory for retracing your steps.
Ambidextrous: you are equally capable with either hand, and in fact can do two things at once (albeit not quite as well as you could do either alone).
Animal Empathy: animals like you.
Contacts: you have contacts in a specific area, who'll help you out in most situations.
Danger Sense: the hairs on the back of your neck quiver when danger is close. You are rarely surprised.
Healthy: you recover from wounds a week faster than you otherwise would, but at a minimum of four days (without medical help) or two days (with medical help).
Lucid Dreaming: you have mastered the techniques of lucid dreaming. This does not appear to offer much of an advantage in life.
Lucky: you gain an extra Fudge Point per session, which cannot be used for character advancement.
Keen Hearing: you can hear soft-pitched whispers from a fair distance; your hearing also has a range a bit outside the human norm.
Quick Reflexes: you react much more quickly than the average bear.
Night Vision: you can see very well in the dark. This isn't infravision; you can't see in absolute darkness and it's not as if you can make out facial details at 60 yards on a moonlit night. But you can pick out people trying to hide in shadows and such.
Reputation: you have a reputation of your choosing (presumably a good one) in a specific field (probably your own).
Single-minded: you get +1 to any extended task roll.
Wealth: you are very well-off. Buy it twice, and you can be rich.
Code of Honor is a special form of Gift. You may take it as a third Gift if you like. You may also pick it up during the campaign at no cost. It provides an advantage in some situations, particularly when resisting outside influences; however, it's a disadvantage in situations where the player really wants the character to act contrary to the code.
How It Works
Task Resolution
FUDGE uses FUDGE dice. FUDGE dice have two 1s, two -1s, and two 0s on 'em. To use a skill, you roll 4 FUDGE dice, resulting in a number between -4 and 4. You move that many steps up or down the ranking ladder; that's the degree of success.
Example: you have Good Science. You roll 4dF, and get a +2. You achieve a Superb success.
Different tasks will have different difficulty levels. If, in the previous example, you were trying to calculate the amount of force you'd need to launch a rocket out of the Earth's gravity well, that'd be pretty simple; you'd only need, say, a Mediocre result. If you were trying to figure out a new theory to account for the effect of vampiric blood on mice, you'd need a Great result.
Opposed actions are just like normal actions, except that each party rolls two FUDGE dice, modifies their skills by the result, and compares outcomes. The high outcome determines the relative degree of success or failure.
Example: you have Fair Seduction. You attempt to seduce the German scientist. You get a +1 and a 0 on your dice, which pushes your Seduction attempt up to a Good. The scientist has Fair Will, and rolls a -1 and a 0. That drops his Will result to a Mediocre. You succeed in your seduction attempt.
If the scientist was suspicious -- perhaps his boss told him there was a cute spy around -- he might have gotten a +1 or +2 to his roll. It wouldn't have gotten him a successful resist, but he might have been less prone to falling asleep afterwards, which would make it more difficult for you to steal his research notes.
Combat
FUDGE Cabal uses story element combat. This is a fairly loose style of combat resolution; if it doesn't work we may revert back to something more rigorous.
In story element combat, the GM explains the situation in as much detail as is apparent, then asks the players to describe what their characters are doing. The more complete the description of their characters' actions, the better the GM know how to assess the situation. This can be important if she has something that won't be revealed until the middle of a battle. Die rolls are required by the GM for each story element.
A story element is the smallest unit of time in this type of combat resolution. The GM may break the battle down into several story elements, or treat the whole encounter as one element. This depends on the GM's style, the importance of the battle, the number of participants, whether or not there are unexpected surprises, etc. Each element should be a dramatic unit.
Damage
Wounds are assigned as appropriate, by the GM. The GM may ask for a damage roll in appropriate situations. Mooks and thugs are likely to go down quickly, without damage rolls; important NPCs are more likely to rack up damage as a PC would. Damage rolls are simply 1 FUDGE die, with the result (-1 to +1) indicating whether the weapon does more, less, or about the same amount of damage one would expect. (Brass knucks usually won't kill a man in one shot; an Uzi might.)
Wound levels are:
Undamaged: no wounds at all.
Just A Scratch: no real game effect, except to create tension. This may eventually lead to being Hurt if the character is hit again.
Hurt: the character is wounded significantly, enough to slow him down. Take a -1 to all rolls which would logically be affected.
Very Hurt: the character is seriously hurt, possibly stumbling. Take -2 to all rolls which would logically be affected.
Incapacitated: the character is so badly wounded as to be incapable of any actions, except possibly dragging himself a few feet every now and then or gasping out an important message.
Near Death: the character is not only unconscious, he'll die in less than an hour -- maybe a lot less -- without medical help. No one recovers from Near Death on their own unless very lucky.
Dead: he has no more use for his possessions, unless he belongs to a culture that believes he'll need them in the afterlife.
Wound levels may be either subdual or lethal, since this is a fairly cinematic campaign.
Healing
A Scratch is too insignificant to require healing. Scratches are usually erased after a battle, provided the characters have five or ten minutes to attend to them.
A Good result on Medicine heals all wounds one level (Hurt to healed, Very Hurt to Hurt, and so on). Scratches do not count as a level for healing purposes. That is, a Hurt wound that is healed one level is fully healed. A Great result heals you two levels, and a Superb result heals three levels. However, the doctor must have access to appropriate medical supplies.
Healing with Medicine also takes time: the success of the roll merely insures the wounds will heal, given enough rest. Generally speaking, after medical attention you'll heal at the rate of one wound level per three days of rest.
Otherwise, wounds heal on their own at one wound level per week of rest. That is, after a week of rest, an Incapacitated character becomes Very Hurt, etc.
Someone Near Death takes a long time to heal, even with magical or high tech healing.
Character Advancement & Fudge Points
The GM will award 1 to 3 Fudge Points per session. You may spend these as follows:
From To Costs
Terrible Poor 1 FP
Poor Mediocre 1 FP
Mediocre Fair 1 FP
Fair Good 2 FP
Good Great 4 FP
Great Superb 8 FP
Superb Legendary 16 FP + GM permission
("Hey, what's that Legendary stuff?" "Never you mind.")
Raising an attribute costs triple the cost for skills of the same level. Adding a gift costs 6 FP (or more) + GM approval.
You may also use one Fudge Point to do any of the following things:
Spend one Fudge Point to alter a die roll one level, up or down as desired. The die roll can be either one the player makes, or one the GM makes that directly concerns the player's character.
Spend one Fudge Point to declare that wounds aren't as bad as they first looked. This reduces the intensity of each wound by one or two levels (a Hurt result becomes a Scratch, for example, or even a Very Hurt becomes a Scratch).
Spend a GM-set number of Fudge Points to ensure a favorable coincidence, subject to GM veto. For example, if the PCs are in a maximum security prison, perhaps one of the guards turns out to be the cousin of one of the PCs! The player outlines the desired coincidence, and the GM decides how many points it will cost. (Probably just one, but you never know.)
Other Stuff
There are no rules for magic, psionics, or other weirdness in this guide. That's on purpose. This should not be taken to mean that PCs will never be able to use magic, psionics, or other weirdness.
