game mechanics – Page 2 – the Dee Sanction

Checking the Numbers

December 8, 2020

There’s a weird juggling act going on between totally freestyle game design and having a solid structure of checks and balances. On the one hand, the numbers should make perfect sense. On the other hand, balance blows. Don’t get me wrong, there does need to be some kind of structure … Continue ReadingChecking the Numbers

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Lever — RPGaDay #25

September 4, 2020September 4, 2020

The system for The Dee Sanction provides a very basic combat system and approach with the levers and pulleys to make a formidable opponent terrifying and a weak one, necessarily, a pushover. At the same time, I have been trying to find the best way possible to make it pseudo-compatible with other … Continue ReadingLever — RPGaDay #25

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Favour — RPGaDay #27

August 27, 2020August 27, 2020

In The Dee Sanction, favours are an example of the lowest form of Angelic magick, base acts of command over the elemental forces that make up the landscape of the etheric realm. Favours work once per game session and automatically work, unless inhibited or prevented from activating — for example, if the … Continue ReadingFavour — RPGaDay #27

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Push — RPGaDay #21

August 25, 2020August 25, 2020

The Agents of Dee are always looking to push on and weather the storm, as the system opts to Fail Forward rather than simply to fail (I touch upon the concept in Meet). There is no push mechanic, as such. You can spend Fortune to re-roll a really bad throw, but otherwise … Continue ReadingPush — RPGaDay #21

Game Mechanics RPGaDAY

Rest — RPGaDay #13

August 12, 2020August 13, 2020

An Agent must have the equivalent of a full night’s rest (i.e. about 8 hours) to recover all of their Hits—starting characters have 3. Otherwise, they recover a single Hit for every two hours of uninterrupted sleep. However, sometimes rest is insufficient. Some enemies inflict Consequences that are not as … Continue ReadingRest — RPGaDay #13

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Light — RPGaDay #9

August 11, 2020August 11, 2020

It would be fair to say that The Dee Sanction is system light. It isn’t entirely intentional, but I’ve never liked heavy. I mean, I can read hundreds of pages, but can I keep them all inside my head. And would I expect anyone else to do the same? The … Continue ReadingLight — RPGaDay #9

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Tribute — RPGaDay #5

August 10, 2020

If there’s a tribute to be espied from The Dee Sanction‘s development, it would be in the form of the developing role of the Usage Die. The concept appeared notably (but not uniquely) in The Black Hack as an easy mechanism to track consumables without keeping a precise tally. Seeing that … Continue ReadingTribute — RPGaDay #5

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Change — RPGaDay #2

August 2, 2020August 3, 2020

The real change at the heart of The Dee Sanction has always been in the system. If you look back to the original post on this site, 214, you will see the first mention of the system and the plans for playtesting. That was October 2014. In that iteration, you rolled … Continue ReadingChange — RPGaDay #2

Game Mechanics Playtesting

The Me in Team

December 9, 2014

Teamwork. What is it good for? That’s a tough one. In the session of The Dee Sanction I ran at Dragonmeet on Saturday, I found the teamwork dynamic of the group worked quite well. When someone faced a challenge and they rolled outside their success threshold, the team generally jumped … Continue ReadingThe Me in Team

Events Playtesting

Playtesting at Dragonmeet

December 7, 2014

Dragonmeet 2014 at the ILEC Conference Centre saw me running another playtest session of 214. I ran The Dee Sanction setting using a new adventure called “The Holy Wax Infant of Prague“. I had five players and a table in the open gaming area (where I had the opportunity to … Continue ReadingPlaytesting at Dragonmeet