Here’s the basics of the Transcendence RPG:
| Power | Finesse | Toughness | |
| Physical | Strength | Agility | Vitality |
| Mental | Intelligence | Wisdom | Will |
| Soul | Psyche | Charisma | Spirit |
Attributes range from zero to ten, with five being the normal human maximum. Some things, like technology, magic, or mutation, can raise these above five. Some races also have higher abilities than humans, but never by a great amount.
Skills then are as such:
- Strength
- Athletics
- Brawl
- Melee Weapon Combat
- Mobility
- Agility
- Acrobatics
- Drive
- Ranged Combat
- Stealth
- Vitality
- Intelligence
- History
- Investigation
- Science
- Technology
- Wisdom
- Medicine
- Nature
- Perception
- Religion
- Will
- Psyche
- Alchemy
- Expression
- Intimidate
- Occult
- Charisma
- Deception
- Insight
- Persuasion
- Streetwise
- Spirit
I’ll go into further details on what each skill covers at in a later post, but I think most are pretty self-explanatory. For skills, you can have five ranks maximum.
Then there is gear. Weapons are broken down into types, simple, martial, ranged, exotic. Maybe some others in there, I’m still working on it. A weapon also has a rank, so a simple club might have a rank of 1, while a slug throwing pistol would be 4. These are easily possible to change as well.
Other gear has ranks too. A simple computer might only have a rank of 2, while a super computer could be 5 or 6. Armor also has a rank depending on the type of damage (LI, HI, En). Low Impact, High Impact, Energy.
Then there are things like Magic, Prayers, Psionics, and Mutations. How do these all interact?
First, Magic. Magic is broken down into a few different types of casting spells. Since magic is a learned skill that can be taught to anyone, it falls under Mental (Intelligence). Magic in Xenomega is in essence a form of science, so it also uses that skill, but requires the Magic Teaching feat to cast spells. Learning about magic forms uses the Occult or Alchemy skill and creating things like magic items or potions also falls under Alchemy. Spells will be broken down into groups of actions that can be attempted. To have a specific spell, the character would have to have the right combination of feats to build that spell.
For example, lets look at a typical RPG spell: fireball. To cast fireball, you would need several feats. First, a feat that allows damaging magic (blast or something similar). Then you would need a feat that allows you to throw a spell a distance. Third, you’d need to be able to summon fire, and finally, and explosive component. With these four feats, you can cast a spell that does ranged fire damage and explodes on impact.
Now onto Prayers. These are ways to interact with a deity and ask for favor. Prayers are taught by others who already know them or learned from tomes and grimoires. They are specific rituals that do very limited things. Sometimes they require several people, but they always take more than a few minutes to perform. In some cases, Prayers will require drawing a magic circle on the ground, lighting candles, maybe sacrificing something, and doing everything else to get the deities attention. Different deities have different prayers that they will answer.
Prayers require dedication, patience, and adherence to a set of rules that dictate each individual prayer. Prayers use the Occult skill.
Third, Psionics. These are mental abilities that are born in a person, not learned. In Xenomega, psionics are relatively common and often associated with mutations. Psionics are bought with feats, but unlike magic, psionics use power points and contained powers. A power is the simple ability to do something with the mind that normal folk cannot do. Power points are measured by Will. The higher the Will, the more power points available. A psychic uses power points to pay for powers and they can boost them by spending more points. When all points are expelled, the psychic cannot use any more powers until they rest. Powers default to a cost of one that signifies their most limited ability. Spending more points boosts the power and allows it to do more damaging things, or something at a greater distance, or affect more foes.
Mutations are the final FX. Mutations are things people are born with that allows them to do things that non-mutants cannot do. They either add a small attack or bonus, a higher attribute, or any other strange thing that hasn’t yet been thought of. They can replace a weapon attack, give insight to dodge attacks, or even add a new form of movement. Mutations can usually be activated an unlimited amount of times, but some more powerful ones will be taxing on the character.
Now, how does this all work together in the game?
All actions are resolved with a dice pool of six-sided dice. There are three types of dice: Base, Gear, and FX. To do something simple that just requires an attribute and skill, add the attribute score and skill score and roll that many dice. For every “6” that comes up, count each as one success. The more successes, the better chance of achieving the goal. Many checks are opposed though, so the player would have to roll more successes than the opponent in order to best them.
Then there are Gear dice. Gear dice have a success on a “6”, but also have a Glitch on a “1”. For each Glitch rolled, a success from the Gear dice is erased. If there are more Glitches than successes, something catastrophic happens to the item and it stops working. Note that Glitches do not count against Base successes, so even if something would succeed, if the end Gear result is one or more Glitches, something bad happened.
Finally, there are FX dice. FX dice are based on the level of the FX being used, whether Magic, Prayer, Psionic, or Mutation. The more FX dice used, the more chance of success, just like with Base and Gear dice. The reason for keeping FX dice separate from Base dice is because some creatures will be resistance to certain types of attacks. A demon may have a resistance to Prayers(2), so any success under two on the FX dice does not affect it. The prayer was still successful, but the demon is simply too powerful and ignores the spell. Most creatures are not like this though, so usually enough successes will work.
Now, with combat. Say you are shooting at an enemy. You roll to strike (Agility + Ranged + Pistol). You roll seven successes, a hit. The enemy has armor on though that has HI 3, so they subtract three successes and take 4 points of damage. They could also have been actively hiding behind cover, subtracting another point of damage from the total inflicted. The target then rolls a Toughness save, so they roll Base dice equal to their Vitality, and subtract that many successes from the damage total. It is possible in this way for a character to take a shot, damage absorbed by the armor, and ignore the rest because they are resilient.
That’s what I have for now. I think I’m on to something.
