Swords N Shit

System-Agnostic Module: This system can be plugged into any TTRPG where the players feel it is a tonally appropriate method of resolution. 

Deterministic: The system is all-skill, no-luck, using no randomizers.

1v1 personal combat resolution: The system is presently designed to resolving two essentially-human-scale combatants fighting without outside interference.

The SWORDS N SHIT engine (loosely speaking) is based around two players playing rock-paper-scissors, but also betting on their own rock, paper, or scissors outcomes. The loser's bets are all lost and the winner recovers only what they bet on 

Betting consists of two parts:

• Three locked-in blind bids of 2 points, 1 point, and 0 points are distributed to the 3 outcomes as each player likes. These are committed permanently for the whole match.
• 3 rounds of bidding take place. Each turn, you have 3 options:
  • Place 2 tokens in 1 of rock, paper, or scissors
  • Place 1 token in any 2 of rock, paper, or scissors
  • "Fold" - lose your 3 tokens in the blind, but reset all bidding to the neutral state.
• After 3 rounds of bidding plus the blind (for a total 9 tokens on each side), the players have a moment to think before they simultaneously reveal their chosen rock, paper, or scissors.
  • The loser loses all 9 tokens bid; they are removed from the game.
  • The winner gains the bid they put in the outcome they chose (tokens in rock if they chose rock to beat their opponent's scissors, etc.), then gains an additional 3 tokens (the value of their blind bid).
  • Ties go to whichever player has more tokens in the chosen outcome, but the winner only gains their blind bid and the difference between their bid and the loser's in that outcome. If the players chose the same outcome and had the same number of tokens, all tokens are lost.

Anyway, that shit is all fluffed up in some martial arts bullshit, have fun reading it if you think you'll enjoy it. It's not done, but it is playable and the one session of playtesting I got in went well.

Created for BadTTRPGs Jam 2: The Game Ideas Are Still Bad.

Swords N Shit by Lexi A. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It'll probably be a while before I pick this up again, so have at it if you think there's something to be gained from using elements of it.