Quasi-Funky Dice
Before I renewed my love affair with Risus, I spent several months in a passionate fling with Risus' younger step-sister, PDQ. I began my flirtation with PDQ because I encountered a situation in Risus that I initially had trouble resolving. At issue was Risus' ability to handle supers and other super-scale characters. Sure, Risus has Funky Dice (and for the Funkyphobic, rescaled Target Numbers from the Risus Companion). But where (I thought) Risus fell down was the intersection of the Funky and the not-so-Funky (i.e. the Super and the Normal).
In Truth & Justice (the supers-themed version of PDQ), there are explicitly two scales of qualities (which look very much like Risus cliches). I saw this and I though "Cool!".
When I started rediscovering Risus, I wondered if I couldn't use something similar. I thought cliches could be either "Normal" or "Super Scale". The two two types of cliches would use different TN scales and Funky Dice would be unnecessary. In a cliche-to-cliche conflict, Supers would get a big boost (perhaps forcing the non-super character to use the "When Somebody Can't Participate" rules).
This sounded great at first but I eventually rejected the idea. First, I couldn't come up with a way to price these super cliches. Second, it didn't seem like all that much of an improvement over Funky Dice. Unlike T&J Powers (as opposed to regular PDQ Qualities), Risus cliches are almost-always a big sack of abilities. In a super cliche, some of these abilities might indeed be super. Other abilities might be rather mundane uses of the cliche that don't operate on the super scale.
Finally, I decided that I really was spending too much time worrying over nothing. The solution, it seemed to me, was that Funky cliches don't have to be entirely Funky. Either a player character can voluntarily nerf aspects of their cliche in certain situations (rolling 3d6 instead of 3d10), or the GM set parameters for what is super and for what it not.
For example, let's take the Funky cliche "Vampire Gunslinger (4d10)". This a perfectly reasonable Risus cliche. In a combat where the character is making the most of their vampire powers, a full application of the Funky Dice is warranted. But does the character get the full 4d10 in a battle of reputations? How about knowledge of firearms? Familiarity with the laws and customs of vampire society? It's up to the Player and the GM to work that out, but certainly it's not all that different from the normal give-and-take that's involved in arbitrating what's covered in a Risus cliche.
I refer you to a quote from the Risus Companion: "When using Funky Dice, the number of dice still indicates expertise, on exactly the same scale as normal Risus. So, a Soldier (3) is just as skilled as a Super-Soldier (3d20)." An expert Vampire Gunslinger (4d10) is an expert at being a Vampire Gunslinger. The d10 part comes from the extra oomph of have Vampire speed, strength, toughness, and senses. But those kewl vampire powers don't always help with certain aspects of being a vampire or with being a gunslinger. For the regular stuff, 4d6 might be more appropriate.
NOTE: There was a thread on this very topic on the RisusTalk yahoo group in 2007. Being in Risus exile, I was oblivious to it at the time.
In Truth & Justice (the supers-themed version of PDQ), there are explicitly two scales of qualities (which look very much like Risus cliches). I saw this and I though "Cool!".
When I started rediscovering Risus, I wondered if I couldn't use something similar. I thought cliches could be either "Normal" or "Super Scale". The two two types of cliches would use different TN scales and Funky Dice would be unnecessary. In a cliche-to-cliche conflict, Supers would get a big boost (perhaps forcing the non-super character to use the "When Somebody Can't Participate" rules).
This sounded great at first but I eventually rejected the idea. First, I couldn't come up with a way to price these super cliches. Second, it didn't seem like all that much of an improvement over Funky Dice. Unlike T&J Powers (as opposed to regular PDQ Qualities), Risus cliches are almost-always a big sack of abilities. In a super cliche, some of these abilities might indeed be super. Other abilities might be rather mundane uses of the cliche that don't operate on the super scale.
Finally, I decided that I really was spending too much time worrying over nothing. The solution, it seemed to me, was that Funky cliches don't have to be entirely Funky. Either a player character can voluntarily nerf aspects of their cliche in certain situations (rolling 3d6 instead of 3d10), or the GM set parameters for what is super and for what it not.
For example, let's take the Funky cliche "Vampire Gunslinger (4d10)". This a perfectly reasonable Risus cliche. In a combat where the character is making the most of their vampire powers, a full application of the Funky Dice is warranted. But does the character get the full 4d10 in a battle of reputations? How about knowledge of firearms? Familiarity with the laws and customs of vampire society? It's up to the Player and the GM to work that out, but certainly it's not all that different from the normal give-and-take that's involved in arbitrating what's covered in a Risus cliche.
I refer you to a quote from the Risus Companion: "When using Funky Dice, the number of dice still indicates expertise, on exactly the same scale as normal Risus. So, a Soldier (3) is just as skilled as a Super-Soldier (3d20)." An expert Vampire Gunslinger (4d10) is an expert at being a Vampire Gunslinger. The d10 part comes from the extra oomph of have Vampire speed, strength, toughness, and senses. But those kewl vampire powers don't always help with certain aspects of being a vampire or with being a gunslinger. For the regular stuff, 4d6 might be more appropriate.
NOTE: There was a thread on this very topic on the RisusTalk yahoo group in 2007. Being in Risus exile, I was oblivious to it at the time.
posted by Risus Monkey at 3:42 PM
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