Designing a Framework

One of my biggest mistakes has been trying to design a game with Fudge. No, I’m not saying that Fudge is a bad choice for designing games with. In fact, Fudge is an excellent choice for designing games with. My mistake is that I jumped right into trying to design the “ULTIMATE RPG!!” gaming geek wet dream of a system.

That just doesn’t exist. Maybe for you, but not for me. I’ll never be happy with just one system. One wife, yes. I’m very happy with that situation (love you baby!), but one gaming system? Just me and the whatever edition of system X until death do us part? No way. I’m the swinging bachelor whore of games. No commitments here. Its not you, game, its me. I need to be free. 🙂

Yet like an idiot I started off trying to write a universal game that you could use to play anything with based on Fudge. Made sense at the time. Fudge allows you to play any genre, any character type, and you can easily make a decision on the spot on how to handle an unforeseen situation with the Fudge system. It rocks!

That is because Fudge doesn’t tell you what to do at all! Yes there are contributions from many people out there who have beefed up Fudge with lots of material so that you can play many different kinds of games. None of those materials are Fudge though. Fudge is essentially three things to me:

1. The ranks ladder for traits.
2. A random results generator that has a bell curve favoring no adjustment to the attribute being rolled against.
3. A lack of details as to what your game should be like.

Fudge doesn’t tell you how a character should be created. Instead Fudge gives you an amazingly simple yet versatile system with which you design a character creation system that works best for your game. You don’t have to search for the official rules on magic or space combat. You just design your own rules, use material somebody else has already designed with Fudge, or “Just Fudge It!” and get back to the game. With Fudge less is definitely more.

This means that all I need is a framework for my game and from that framework I can flesh out the system. Such a framework is a series of components that are linked to create a structure. That is what I have been working on and these are the components that I will be releasing as the first draft of the game:

• The Ranks Ladder
• Randomizing Results
• Attributes
• Skills
• Gifts & Flaws
• Items
• Combat (Close & Ranged)
• Damage & Healing
• Character Growth & Change (I am designing a system where this does not always mean character improvement.)
• Character Sheet

I will be posting my take on each of these components in their rough and simple forms to this blog for the next two weeks or so. If you find these posts to be interesting as they are released, or if you think that I am just plan wrong with my approach feel free to comment with your thoughts on the matter. That is another great thing about Fudge – everyone has a take on it that is as unique as their games are.