Questions tagged [system-agnostic]

For questions that are explicitly not restricted to any one particular system or rules, where the asker wants solutions to the question that are not directly tied to a game's mechanics.

A question is not related to any one particular system of rules.

In general, questions should be about the problem you face, and if you have an issue within a specific game system you should ask within the context of that game. Do not widen your scope to "make it more useful for others"; in most cases, your question and answer(s) will be more useful if it is more focused.

However, there are some issues which transcend specific games/game mechanics and, in that case, can be tagged as . This conveys that you are looking for solutions not directly tied to a game's mechanics, or that you are but don't care what.

You don't really need to use a system tag at all in many circumstances. For instance, "How do I deal with a player that shows up late?" doesn't need to be explicitly tagged system-agnostic. The tag is instead a signifier for questions about something that happens in-game, but when you are looking for techniques not rooted in a specific set of game rules.

If you're still unsure of this tag's usage, check out the relevant FAQ.

553 questions
20
votes
9 answers

Rewards for a cancelled session?

If a referee has to cancel a session at very short notice, what rewards to the players are sensible? For example part of a sessions exps, bennies or hero points.
David Allan Finch
  • 11,197
  • 3
  • 37
  • 96
11
votes
1 answer

Fine Granularity Hunting / Gathering / Fishing resources

I'm running a Session where my players spend long times on their own in woods / planes (etc.) and need to feed themselves from their surroundings. So I wrote a hunting / gathering program that determinate what animals / plants etc. are in the region…
Angelo Fuchs
  • 1,178
  • 8
  • 19
11
votes
5 answers

How do underground tunnels stay up? Is it possible to dig under a castle wall without magic to support the tunnel?

I'm considering running a quest where the players must deal with a large, powerful, and well organized underground Kobold tribe. They initially find the opening of a tunnel in the middle of a village the kobolds invaded during the night. They dug…
Gordon Gustafson
  • 5,660
  • 4
  • 27
  • 42
10
votes
7 answers

How well does "attractiveness" work as a stat?

Does attractiveness as a stat or attribute work in an RPG setting? I know it was included in oWoD, but then was trashed later on in nWoD. Why? What effect does it have on player choices? Are they positive or negative? Objective bullet point pros and…
AncientSwordRage
  • 13,455
  • 8
  • 110
  • 291
8
votes
6 answers

Should there be in-game consequences for taking too long to plan?

As a player in a D&D 5e campaign, our party was presented with a battlefield with several different environmental features (in this case, a goblin cave entrance with an alarm system and two watchtowers). We ended up planning and deliberating how to…
smcg
  • 1,098
  • 2
  • 10
  • 15
6
votes
2 answers

Is there a good guidleline for "Assumed Character Actions" vs Necessary Descriptions?

It should go without saying that to some extent in any given role playing setting there needs to be a general set of assumptions made about the actions of the characters. Some of these are naturally built in, for instance in current editions of D&D…
Patrick
  • 868
  • 8
  • 14
6
votes
1 answer

How can you safely handle one of the PCs being central to the plot?

I'm trying my hand at writing my own RPG campaign, but I've run into a potentially fatal flaw in my story idea in that it's dependent upon a rather specific kind of character being a member of the party. First, some background: the story involves…
Cobalt
  • 6,961
  • 10
  • 51
  • 95
5
votes
0 answers

Is a Fractal Maze truly unsolvable?

I recently discovered the concept of fractal mazes from this question about running mazes without maps, and I'm incredibly interested, as I think it'll fit the unsettling tone I'm going for in my current campaign beautifully. However, I'm the first…
Cooper
  • 9,566
  • 3
  • 38
  • 71
4
votes
0 answers

Characters and combat mindset

One of my main characters (a rather long-lived and notable one in the world she is in) has quite a considerable degree of combat mindset/mentality (hardening, if you will) imparted to her (i.e. not only is she capable of executing combat techniques …
Shal
  • 41
  • 2
4
votes
2 answers

Where is a website that lists non-traditional genre RPG scenarios and systems

I mean not science fiction, not fantasy, not horror. My Japanese wife (passable English) said she is interested to try doing RPG but she has no interest in those genres- she has seen a few movies. She like reading School Manga so that's a possible…
user2617804
  • 611
  • 6
  • 20
3
votes
1 answer

Collaboration on various ideas

This may even be exactly the place that I'm looking for, still learning to navigate the site and kind of its purpose. But is there a forum area where people can discuss their own ideas for campaign settings and more in an open seminar format than a…
MoShade
  • 317
  • 1
  • 2
  • 7