Detriments (I hate coming up with names for stuff)

What I hate most about my sick need to make a RPG of my own is coming up with names for stuff.  When I look at other games I think to myself "Oh, there is a good name for something."  But then immediately feel self-conscious about plagiarism.

This is not healthy because I am drawn to games, especially homebrew games (I am really liking where StarGazer is taking Gears -- http://www.stargazergames.eu/2010/05/04/catch-a-glimpse-of-gears/ ).  But when I look at them it is like I have seen something which I can not un-see and therefore am aware of "copying".

There are so many things you can call a spade (Shovel.. ah, spade.. digging-stick?), so it should not be a surprise to use a name for a mechanic in a game the same name as another game.

In "the Counting Game" (yep, still keeping with that name), you have abilities which are worth character creation points.  The good ones that help you cost points and the bad ones give you points.  I'd call the ones that cost points "abilities" but have been on the fence as what to call the ones that give you points back.  The opposite of an ability is a disability, but it would not be politically correct or sensitive to use "disability", right?

Then that makes me say "Disadvantage" and then ability becomes "Advantage".  If you are a GURPS player, you see that that is a term they use.  I don't like that, I'd rather steal from a more obscure source.  So I have been thinking of calling them "Detriments"..

Yeah, I hate coming up with names for stuff.. I stink at it...

Gaming this last weekend with my kids..

My wife went out of town this last weekend and I had the kids.  We watched "Iron Giant", "Princess Bride" and the older one and I watched "Dune".  We also had a chance to play a very short game of "Fair Use Space Opera" similar to a unrelated Space Opera with the initials of "S.W."

The game was a big hit with my 7 year old.  He was instantly fascinated by the idea of numbers on paper to simulate the world and dice to decide how things work out.  He was very excited and we had a great time.  His brutish "Space Trooper" had a hard time with pushing the correct buttons and natural 20s resulted in some exploding control panels.  Great comic fare for a 7 year old.

Character creation was interesting, he has a great grasp on mathematics but most of the process was verbal -- "Could your guy walk a tightrope without a net?"  His 7 year-old exuberance left him wanting to play the "Ultra" version where attributes normally on the scale of 1-20 were in the hundreds.  While this was possible, it is not really playable.

I look forward to playing again soon with them as each time it is a lot of fun.

Cyberpunk Character: Larry

Larry was born in 1986, in 2032 he was 46. Back in 2008 Larry graduated from college with a degree in Computer Science.  In 2010 he got a job with the government and by the time 2017 rolled around, Larry was married with a son and happy.

In 2020 Larry took a job with the Department of Homeland Security and started work on "black" projects.  The demands of these classified projects and constant moves to seek promotions took their toll on his marriage and in 2025, at the age of 39 Larry had divorced and lost all custody of his son in a bitter court battle.  Larry became bitter and started drinking.  

About this time, the North American Union was formed and the government functions of the United States, Canada and Mexico merged.  The merge of functions impacted domestic Law Enforcement the most as the prior laws and agencies changed over to uniform laws.  These changes cost Larry the promotions he had been seeking. Larry's bitterness left him a drunk and a racist.  He blamed all his problems on "non-whites", but specifically on "Mexicans".  In 2030, Larry moved to a different job at a DHS data center in a position in "Mission 12", a classified DHS unit to track various US Citizens.  

Larry's job initially did not give him access to know why he was tracking these people.  He assumed they were enemies of the state of some sort and that his information was allowing their arrest.  After a year of work on a new version of the tracking system, Larry noticed in the local news two of his targets (a mother and daughter) had been found dead beside the interstate in a maintenance tunnel.  After a quick Google, Larry was surprised to learn that every one of his targets in the last year were either missing or dead and none had been published in any court documents.  While he could accept several of the targets had likely been "Mexican Gang members", not all of them could be criminals and therefore not all deserved to be dead.

Upon this search in Google, Larry's accesses were flagged and within a month he was placed on probationary leave.  He did receive a "Operating a Manual Vehicle Under the Influence" but Larry was convinced it had more to do with his discovery.  While on administrative leave Larry discovered a flaw in the tracking system which gave him access to tracking query targets in real time. 

Starting with just one person, Larry rescued the targets from arrest and potential murder at the hands of "Mission 12".  Now Larry is a target himself but will not stop until this shadowy police unit is disbanded and the targets are allowed to live in freedom.  He still dislikes "non-whites" and misses his family.  He knows if he every attempts contact with his son it will cost both of them their lives, so he refuses to admit his desire to find him.

Larry

MP (Wisdom):       10 (Average)

MS (Intelligence):   11 (Above Average)

ME (Willpower):     11 (Stubborn)

MI (Charisma):        8 (Below Average)

BP (Strength):         9 (Below Average)

BS (Dexterity):       10 (Average)

BE (Endurance):      9 (Below Average)

BI (Beauty):            8 (Below Average)

Skills:

Government Computer Systems(MS) +14

Computer Vulnerability Exploitation(MS) +10

Government Contacts(MS) +6

Detriments:

Wanted Criminal (treason): -15

Compelled to help victims of "Mission 12" targeting: -5

Racist (toward "non-whites"): -3

Alcoholism: -3

Cyberpunk Character: Annita Gonzales "Bogon"

Annita planned a career in Cosmetology.  She studied fashion, make-up and hairstyles constantly.  As she graduated high school her ambition had already gotten her a seat at a local stylist's shop.  The owner of the shop had offered to pay part of the tuition for her to attend the local beauty school.

Her plans were cut short when her youngest brother was arrested for robbing a high-end electronics store.  She had no doubt of her brother's innocence because the night in question he was at home very sick with allergies (the smog in the city was very hard on him).  Despite her testimony, he was convicted based entirely on facial recognition testimony from the security cameras used by the store and public security surveillance systems.

Annita was determined to prove her brother's innocence.  She began to experiment with the security systems in the beauty shop where she worked and was able to exploit issues with the facial recognition software using disguises, movements and even special tattoos.  As she was ready to bring her research to the attention of the authorities for an appeal of her brother's case, his health had failed and he eventually passed away in jail.

Annita then became dedicated to finding the real thieves who had robbed the store to bring them to justice.  She hopes that by penetrating the Underground and establishing a reputation for her skills of surveillance avoidance she will be able to gather the evidence needed to get the actual thieves arrested.

Now Annita goes by the name "Bogon" which comes from the name of network traffic which should not be there but is allowed to pass within a network anyhow.  She can hide in plain sight by avoiding video surveillance or quickly disguising herself.  Because of the prevalence of video surveillance, her skills are in high demand by both criminals and fugitives.  She will often help fugitives who remind her of her brother's plight of wrongful accusation.

Annita Gonzales "Bogon"

MP (Wisdom):       12 (Above Average)

MS (Intelligence):   14 (Genius)

ME (Willpower):     11 (Stubborn)

MI (Charisma):       10 (Average)

BP (Strength):         9 (Below Average)

BS (Dexterity):       11 (High Average)

BE (Endurance):      9 (Below Average)

BI (Beauty):           12 (Pretty)

Skills:

Cosmetics (MS)+4

Hair Styling (MS)+2

Tattoo (MS) +2

Video Surveillance Systems (MS) +5

Detriments:

Compelled to go into harm's way to avenge her brother: -10

Minor Criminal: -5

Compelled to help fugitives avoiding wrongful prosecution: -6

What is the Counting Game System?

The name is not very sexy but it is what I have called it all these years.  I am content with the name because I have not come up with anything better and my kids are happy to call it that.

Now what is it?  In a nutshell of RPG design babble, it is a generic, point-based, rules-medium, skill-oriented system with a flexible classic die rolling system.

Before I dissect what that gobbledygook means to me, I want to say that the mission of this game is to provide a system where anyone can play it at any time with materials at hand.  I am not fond of LARP, I personally feel too self-conscious acting out my character, so the mission does not include the need to consider LARP as a playing option.  What the mission does mean to me is to provide a balanced and flexible system where the basic rules are simple enough to be remembered and the game can be played wherever there are people with paper and pencils.

First the system is Generic.  It is not oriented to a specific genre or setting for a game.  This is in homage to GURPS and the fickle nature of my pool of players (kids you know, one day it is spaceships and the next day it is giant robots).  As we all know a generic system with no game world is very boring (unless you are a fellow game designer), so a major impediment to publication is the lack of a game world. In a future post I will go over some of the best game world candidates for my initial release.  At this point I see the system as a way to describe and play in a world of the player's choosing with characters of their choosing.  As a web developer the system is like HTML and the game world is a fully designed web site, so the same people who are interested in a generic system might also read up on the latest HTML 5 specification (but most people would prefer to go to a fully developed web site).

Generic systems have a few pitfalls.  The first pitfall is the issue of over-generic-ness.  A GURPS implementation of the D&D world is very different from the D&D world.  A GURPS version of a 7th level Mage is... well it should be a crime to do that on top of the fact it is a lot of work to not only design the character but also pick the advantages and disadvantages that mesh with D&D.  It would require several books to just begin to cover all the material necessary.  In this system the creation rules are straight-forward and simple.  Each character, item, skill or power is evaluated for it's useful parts to determine its value in points - more on that in other posts.

The more major pitfall of generic games is the idea of character progression and playing the same character long term.  In a D&D game (should I specify that I only speak of the Second Edition?) you start with a character that is basically worthless but work to become more and more powerful.  Working to get those xp becomes an obsession.  Generic games do not really have this, they are typically class-less and level-less, so the character you start out with is the one you envisioned during creation.  There is no next level that drives you on to play.  This leads generic games to be more one-shot or shorter term than other styles.  I don't actually see this as a problem, if you were to take the average ten year old through the creation process and then have a few asthmatic cockroaches nearly kill them after six hours of play?  The would be back to their Nintendo before you could tell them that they still needed to play a few dozen hours before they could last 10 seconds with a dragon.  A generic game lets the player choose the character they want to play without hours and hours of dealing with level 1 issues.

This is a point-based system.  In this system every attribute, skill, power and weakness is worth points.  These same points are used for healing, damage, purchases and skill rolls.  This is a universal currency for everything in the game.  Some systems have hit points, skill points, attribute points, luck points, kitten points, etc - each with a unique exchange rate.  This is way too complex.  One attribute point can be exchanged for a point to increase a skill/power/buy equipment/etc.  On a side note, there are no hit points - when you take any sort of damage it comes off of the character's attributes or skills or powers (it might even increase a disadvantage or weakness).

This is a rules-medium system, meaning that it is not rules-light or rules-heavy.  My exposure to rules-light games left me feeling of potential anarchy, many people hate the government but it comes in handy when people try to steal from or kill you.  Rules are the same way, there must be some rules to check a permissive or obstinate Game Master.  On the contrary, rules-heavy games are gigantic books with tables and formulas for everything.  I would prefer to guess at the velocity of an unladen swallow than check a chart that takes into account fifteen variables.  In this game there is rounding and even bad math just to keep things simple lest someone be forced to look at a chart. 

This is a skill-oriented system.  Many systems are combat oriented, which is fine since most players prefer to "kick butt".  My daughter was the primary reason to change this in my system.  She would prefer not to kill every dragon but instead befriend them and help them live a vegetarian lifestyle.  So, the classic sense of combat is not primary in this game.  Combat is a contest, not actually different from arm-wrestling, competitive eating or even trying to get your boss to give you a raise at the office.  Keeping with the theme of flexibility, skills are all based on attributes so a skill can be untrained and used in relation to the skill's controlling attribute.  But if you take damage, then the decrease in attribute points can lower a skill.

Finally this system has a flexible die mechanic that is based on classic dice rolling.  I love dice, the dice section is my second favorite part of a game store.  A system that would only use one of them is just wrong.  On the other hand what is a person to do when they have a 1d8 axe but no 8 sided dice are to be found?  My super-flawed math skills allow me to suspend belief in my players to substitute dice.  In this system a 1d8 is the same as 2d4, 1d6+1 or even just '4'.  The thought is that the possible values of a 8 sided die are 1 to 8, with 3.5 as an average of those values.  In rounding up that 3.5 becomes a 4 just as a 1d6 becomes a 3 (and so on).  It is imperfect but it is more important to me to have a flexible system than force people to walk around with dice bags tied to their belts (like I did back in 1985).  Since this is a point based system, a 1d8 axe costs 4 points in the first place because that is the average damage it can do.  If a Game Master didn't agree with such silly math then they can play without rolling for damage (but the foundation of role playing is rolling for damage, so I think they will overlook it).

Obviously there are a lot of details to explain in these posts.  My intention with this blog is to explain it and eventually it will be so concise I can publish it (after I decide which game world to go with).  So, for those of you still awake.. you have now read a brief rationalization of this game system with specifics to follow.  

Questions, comments and random musings are welcome!

Creation

Character creation is the most important step in playing a Role Playing Game.  Past games basically had the players sit and randomly create characters to play.  Such randomness was fun and quick but did not allow a player to use the character they wanted.  The randomness also allowed for cheating and players could get maximum attributes with "lucky" rolls.

The lesson of these early systems and rules was to allow some flexibility to allow a player to create a character they wanted to play but still provide balance to the game.  There are many modern ways this issue is dealt with and perhaps many go too far and character creation becomes hours of pouring over books and selecting skills, powers from lists.  

The more time that is wrapped up in creation time, the less available for playing the game.  A creation system for a RPG must balance flexibility with speed to have a player create the character they want in a minimal amount of time.

Here is the creation process for this game:

Step 1: Think about the character you would like to play.  Think of their most distingushing characteristics, things like what they can do, how the act, things that are good about them and things that are not good about them.  There might not be much that is interesting about your character at this point other than maybe an occupation or skill, and that is fine.  When you have a concept of what your character is like, move on to step 2.

Step 2:  Attributes:  Consider your character concept.  Are they smart?  If so, how smart are they? Normal people have 10s for all attributes.  A Nobel scientist might have a MS of 18 or 20, just as an Olympic gymnast might have a BS of 18 or 20. Now down the following on a piece of paper with a pencil: MP:10, MS:10, ME:10, MI:10, BP:10, BS:10, BE:10, BI:10.  These are the attributes.  As you raise one attribute you must lower another, or take disadvantages (later).

Step 3: Skills:  In this game, a skill is necessary for everything the character can do.  Quite often they are default and based upon the controlling attribute.  But there is no substitute for training and skills that are untrained, or default will suffer more modifiers than skills which have been trained.  A skills costs one point per point increase (1/+1), a skill that has a negative modifier is a disadvantage and can be used to pay for other skills, powers or equipment.

Step 4: Powers and Equipment: Selection of powers and equipment is best from a list to speed the creation process, but a basic idea of the cost of an item has to do with it's value in a contest.  For each point the item increases or decreases a skill or attribute in yourself or others, it costs one point.  For each 3 feet (or about 1 meter or yard) of range the item has it costs one point. So a sword that can reach about a meter/yard away and does 5 points of damage, would cost 6 points. (more on item creation later)

Step 5: Disadvantages: A disadvantage is the opposite of a power and instead of costing points, they add points back to the character.  Disadvantages must be played and must have a point value - they are more than "afraid of the dark" where a character carries a glow-stick to avoid the effects of the fear.  Creating disadvantages will be covered further, later.  Basically there are two kinds of disadvantages, constant and conditional.  Constant disadvantages apply all the time, such as blindness where a character is always -10 to see (and would be worth 10 points).  A conditional disadvantage is only in effect for part of the time.  "Afraid of the Dark" where the character is -2 to ME, -2 to MS and -2 BS when they are in the dark.  If this were a constant disadvantage it would be worth 6, but since the character would expect to only be in the dark roughly half the time it is worth 3 points.

Repeat, if necessary.

The most important rule is "you get what you pay for".  If you didn't pay for it then you didn't get it.  So if you make a power called "invisibility" and figure it costs 10 points, because everyone is -10 to see you.  Well, that effects seeing the character, not hearing or smelling them.  On the same note, if you have a disadvantage which is "forgotten" and not used, the points must be given back. Disadvantages that can't be given a rating in numbers are not worth anything.  Like "Kleptomania", unless you can attach a value to the disadvantage then it is not worth much.

Another key thing to remember is that all the points you spend are part of your character.  When you take damage, anything can have points deducted.  So, if you take 6 points in damage it can come from attributes and skills. 

Many things are fun to add to a character, such as hair color and favorite colors.  If you make an especially entertaining character the Game Master running the game might give you some extra points, but a character's favorite color is of little value in a contest.

The contest: Damage is not just for combat.

A mainstay in Role Playing Games is combat.  For the most part this is due to the nature of Role Playing Games, but to some extent it is due to the way these games were developed.  There are no tools in most games for settleing things without combat.

In this game combat is similar to any other contest of skills, the difference is that combat is when characters use skills to inflict bodily harm on each other and that is different from a game of poker or a tennis match.  But, like in combat, each player tries to control the environment to gain the upper hand in the contest.  The players use strategy to outwit and outmaneuver their opponent to achieve victory.  Many skill contests are like combat and therefore, in this game, combat is just a contest of skills.

Such contests have four phases that repeat; Initiative, Action, Reaction, Effect.  Initiative is the process of deciding who will act first, this is usually a dice roll with the highest roll acting first.  Action is when the winner of the Initiative phase (can be called the attacker) uses a skill to gain an advantage in the contest .  Reaction is when the looser of the initiative phase (can be called the defender) tries to avoid the actions of the attacker to lessen the effects of the attacker's actions.  Effect is when the overall actions and reactions are considered and any advantages or penalties are given out (can be called damage).

For example Albert and Betty are to appear on a reality television show called "Combat Cooking" - a "no holds barred" cooking contest where contestants lie, cheat and cook their way to the top.  Each is to cook a dish but can sabotage each other and only the judges decide who is the winner.  As the contest starts, Albert sneaks over to Betty's stove and alters the thermostat so that the stove is actually 75 degrees hotter than it should be.  While Albert is at Betty's station, Betty switches the sugar and salt on Albert's station and adds vinegar to Albert's Strawberry mixture.  Each uses their cooking skills to effect the other's stations and therefore limit how their dishes will turn out.

In this situation, initiative is not important since most of the action is happening at the same time.  Also the action is balanced and the important part is how well the contestants do after the sabotage.  Albert has a cooking skill of +5 and Betty has a cooking skill of +3.  For Albert's sabotage he rolls a 10 and gets a score of 15.  For Betty's reaction to Albert's sabotage, she rolls a 7 and gets a total of 10, Albert wins with difference of 5 points.  For Betty's sabotage she rolls a 4, plus her 3 for a total of 7.  Albert counters with a roll of 17, plus his skill of 5 and gets a total of 22.  Albert is the net winner by 20 points!

What happened is that Albert returns to his station and begins to cook.  Like a good chef, Albert tastes everything and catches the salt mix-up just in time.  He also smells the strawberry mixture and carefully just rinses it and uses the strawberries as garnish.  Betty on the other hand spent too much time watching Albert catch her tricks and does not pay attention while her cake is in the oven.  As her oven timer goes off she notices the smoke from the burnt cake.

There was no damage necessary in this scenario.  Normally damage is associated with skills and equipment specifically paid for at creation time to inflict damage.  In situations where a person wants to inflict damage but has not paid for the ability to do so, then extra effort would be involved and the attacker would receive damage as well - just under the name of "fatigue".  But even without damage a winner can be chosen by looking at the rolls.  In closer matches the players might opt to spend damage points as extra effort to ensure victory.  In real life it would be rare to see such extreme effort in a cooking contest but anything is possible.

The problem with dice and the casual gamer

There is a special group of people who always have dice with them.  Outside of specific areas, carrying dice is not acceptable.  If you are in Las Vegas then carrying two 6 sided dice is common, if you are in a Comic Book Shop, Hobby Store or convention (comic, anime, etc) then carrying a good 20 sided die might be common.  But how often have you been with friends who play RPGs and wanted to play but no one had the necessary materials?  

I first wanted to make my own RPG while a friend and I were no where near the required shelf of RPG books and bag full of dice.  We ended up playing what would now be a LARP style game that progressed awkwardly and no one was happy with the end result.  I decided that a good game system could accommodate the materials at hand and not require extensive books or equipment.

While a random number generator is easy to make on the computer (sample code to follow one day), but the dice assortment usually associated with RPGs is not as easy.  You can find a deck of cards and a pack of 6 sided dice at most convenience stores.  But what if you have a Orc with a battle axe that does 1d12 damage?  Or a Kobold with a dagger that does 1d4?

Another issue is the casual RPG player.  Someone who is trying it for the first time might not like the strange dice RPG gamers use or how to read them.  Many people don't know a d8 from a d10, but do they have to in order to play a game?

Some games avoid these issues by using fist-fulls of dice  where you roll under a number a proper number of times to be successful.  This is also confusing to the casual gamer who might be more used to board games or card games.

In this system all rolls are base upon an average roll.  This might be mathmatically and statically unsound but if you suspend calculation and accept the premise it all makes sense.  A six sided die rolled an infinite number of times will give values from 1 to 6, and the average is 3 (actually 3.5 but we can round down.)  In the same way a four sided die is 2, 8 sided is 4, 10 sided is 5, 12 sided is 6 and 20 sided is 10.  

These average rolls allow for two important things.  The first is that a power/weapon/whatever has an effect (usually damage) which can be paid for with a set number of points.  So a sword might cost 10 points because it does 10 points of damage.  The second feature of using average rolls for dice is dice substitution.  When the character does the damage they can take those 10 points or they can roll.  When they roll for damage, it is based on the average roll of the dice.  For 10, they can roll 3, six sided dice and add one point (3*3=9 + 1 = 10), one 20 sided die or even 5 four sided dice.

Dice substitution is good because it gives players flexibility with what dice they have to use or if they have to use dice at all.  Also, different dice combinations give different ranges of results.  While 3 six sided dice plus 1 is the same average roll as rolling one 20 sided die, the ranges are 4 to 19 for the 3d6+1 and 1-20 for the 1d20.  The 20 sided die can give a higher result as well as a much lower result, ask someone who just rolled a 1 about which way they would have rather rolled.  But if you roll both ways you might end up with a 1 or a 4, had the roll not been chosen then the player would automatically get 10.  It is up to the player as to how much they are willing to give up to chance.

Skills

A skill is a task the character knows how to do.  Skills are the basis for all actions a character  takes in the game.  All actions have an associated skill, from using weapons to cooking food.  Even the characters attributes are used as skills.

A character uses a task on a regular basis to practice it, they have trained on this task with an instructor of some sort.  In training and practice they learn to do this task better than someone trying the task for the first time.  But training and practice do not prevent the character from trying to use a skill, they just do so at the default level.

Skills are written with just the bonus the skill provides to a roll, such as "Cooking +3".  An attribute when used as a skill will be a bonus or penalty depending on if it is above or below 10.  So a BS (Bodily Skill or dexterity) of 12 will be a +2 when used as a skill, but a BS of 9 is -1.

Skills are used two ways, in contest and non-contest situations.  Contest situations is where a skill is directly used against another character's skill.  This can be in combat, in a contest or just to compete with another character.  In a contest roll the goal is to roll with a combined amount higher than the other character.

In a non-contest situation, the character is trying to achieve a goal.  Depending on difficulty, the player must roll below half the controlling attribute plus the skill bonus and attribute modifier (amount above or below 10).  So if a player has a skill of "Whip +3" and is going to use the whip to hit a target and the "Whip" skill is controlled by the BS attribute of 12, then the player must roll below 10 (12/2 = 6, +3skill = 8 +2attribute = 10).  If the target is rather large and the character is very close then the difficulty modifier might be +4 or to roll under 14.

If a character needs to use an attribute as a skill in a non-contest situation then they use half the attribute plus the modifier (amount above or below 10).  So, if a character must try to use their MI (Mental Influence or charisma) to persuade and their MI is 13 then they must roll under 10 (13/2 = 6.5, round up to 7, +3 = 10).

Skills are effected by injury because if a character takes damage, the damage can come directly from a skill or can come from a controlling attribute.  A very high skill will not help if the controlling attribute gets too low.

A character can also use extra effort to make a skill successful.  The character spends attribute points (the attribute points are subtracted just like the character had taken damage and must be healed back) and the points they spend can be used to raise a skill for a roll.

If a player wishes they can simply spend points at creation time to raise a controlling attribute and use their default skill for all rolls.  This is permissible, but not encouraged.  The issue is that a person must practice or be trained to perform some actions at some levels.  A person who never went to school might be very intelligent, but if they were never taught to read then they might have a harder time reading than a less intelligent person who had been taught to read.  So the difficulty  modifier depends on the character's exposure to the situation.

If a character is in a contest situation but does not have the same skill as the other contestants, or has a higher skill they would like to substitute they may if they make a proper argument with the Game Master.  A character in a cooking contest might have a low cooking skill but a high knife skill, they could use the knife skill to cut the food in a decorative way to participate in the contest.

A skill is not just the simple knowledge and practice to perform an action.  An accomplished practitioner of a skill gains a reputation from fellow practicioners as well as customers/friends and the like.  This reputation give the character another way to apply their skill because the skill has value beyond it's actual action.  A skilled cook might be attacked by a gang of criminals, but the cook can use their reputation to scare the criminals or at least offer to cook for them.

Some skills are common to all characters in a given game world, if a skill is assumed to be known to "everyone" then it is part of the controlling attribute.  If the character does not know that skill then it is a disadvantage and the character gets points at creation time to spend elsewhere.  For example, in the modern USA it is assumed that all residents know how to speak and read English, if a resident can't then they get a penalty to read or speak English and can use those points to increase another skill or attribute.  Usually these points will be used to speak or read a different language, but speaking or reading might not be required.

Attributes

A constant in Role Playing Games is the use of attributes.  An attribute is a common skill that all characters have.  It is recorded differently than other skills, it is written in a range of 0 (basically dead or useless) to 10 (average or normal) and on upward to infinity.  The typical range for normal games is 0 to 20, super hero comic book type games might be up to 40 for some attributes.  

Attributes are the basis for skills or provide a bonus to the effect of some skills.  A normal attribute provides no bonus but also no penalty.  A low attribute penalizes the character per point below 10, so a 9 would be a -1 penalty and a 5 would be a -5 penalty.  A high attribute gives a bonus per point above 10, so 12 gives a +2 and 20 gives a +10.

The attributes for this game are modular and can be swapped or changed depending on the game world.  In a typical game world (such as fantasy, modern or even wild west) the characters have attributes for their body and mind (more on that later). But in a high fantasy world were everyone could perform magic there might be additional attributes for a character's magical abilities.  Or a high science fiction world were everyone used computers in a virtual world, there might be attributes associated with that virtual world.

While it is possible to arrange attributes in different and perhaps more concise ways, the attributes for this game (in a normal, realistic game setting) is as follows:

Body Attributes:

     Body Power (BP): Aka Strength.  Gives a bonus to damage by manual attacks as well as distance of thrown objects and weight to lift and carry.

     Body Skill (BS): Aka Dexterity.  This is the basis for most physical skills and therefore rates the natural ability to perform physical tasks.  A character with high BS might do well at physical skills despite lack of training.

     Body Endurance (BE):  Aka Constitution.  This is the basis for a character's ability to heal their body as well as endure physical stresses.

     Body Influence (BI): Aka Beauty.  This is the character's physical appearance and how it might influence others.  This is not just to the opposite gender, many leaders have been chosen by their looks in the past as well as ugly people are often not trusted or considered inferior.

Mind Attributes:

     Mental Power (MP): Aka Wisdom.  Mental Power is the raw ability to memorize facts.  MP might be used from time to time when a character needs to recall something from memory.

     Mental Skill (MS): Aka Intelligence.  Mental Skill is how well the character can think to approach a problem.  MS is used in planning as well as to determine if small details are noticed (including the ability to hear, see or smell).

     Mental Endurance (ME): Aka Temper.  Mental Endurance is the character's ability to withstand mental stress.  ME is used when a character is trying to maintain their temper, resist mental stress (torture and questioning) and healing from mental injury.

     Mental Influence (MI): Aka Charisma.  Mental Influence is the character's ability to influence others through persuasion, speaking or direct coercion.

This might seem like a lot of attributes, but the system is built for modularity and to have a universal approach to attributes.  Any attribute is assumed to be 10, less than 10 awards the character points to be used elsewhere, more than 10 costs points from elsewhere.  If a game requires a quickly generated "average" person, then the person has attributes of all 10s.  Further, if a character from one game world is played in another world where there are additional attributes, the new attributes can be assumed to be all 10s.