Battletit Galactigate

Roleplaying Game

Copyright ©2010 Digidub Games

Version 0.9

These are an abbreviated set of rules for the Battletit Galactigate sci-fi parody roleplaying game. These rules are meant for those already familiar with roleplaying games, and for those that simply want to learn the game quickly. There isn't much setting information contained herein.

Concept

This game is based around rolling a number of 10-sided dice, or d10s, at once and trying to get 8 or higher on as many of the dice as you can. Characters are comprised of attributes, abilities, and equipment. Abilities can be chosen from a list presented by the Space Master (SM), and they can also be made up by the player, and can be almost anything the player wants, as long as it's approved by the SM.

Character Creation

Characters are formed from the attributes Brains, Brawn, Speed, and Vitality. There are also two secondary attributes, Wounds and Fatigue, both based on Vitality. These secondary attributes both start at zero and get added to as you play the game. Attributes will start with certain values based on the race you pick for your character.

Brains: A measurement of your character's mental power.

Brawn: The physical strength of your character.

Speed: Quickness and agility.

Vitality: Health and resilience.

Wounds: The amount of physical damage your character has taken.

Fatigue: How tired and drained your character is.

To create a character, first pick your character's race. Each race starts off with different attribute levels which can then be improved upon with your beginning Space Points. Some races also come with special abilities. The value of these racial special abilities can be improved with Space Points, just like any other ability.

Characters start with 26 Space Points. It costs five Space Points to increase an attribute by one, and two Space Points to increase an ability by one or create a new ability with a starting level of one.

Vitality is a special attribute. After increasing Brains, Brawn, and Speed to where you want them, add Brawn and Speed together then add that total to the level of Vitality that your selected race begins with. After doing that, you can increase Vitality further by spending Space Points on it like any other attribute.

Attribute Bonuses

Sometimes characters can come across equipment that will give them a temporary bonus to one of their attributes. This bonus is written down in the “bonus” box beneath the three main attributes on the character sheet. For instance, if a character came across a robotic glove that gave them a +1 bonus to Brawn when they wore it, the player would write that bonus down in the bonus box beneath Brawn.

Abilities

Abilities come with some races and some equipment. They can also be chosen from a list put together by the SM, if the SM has made an ability list, and players can always create their own abilities, too. Sometimes they allow your character to do special things, like understand all languages instantly or play music with your armpit, and they give bonuses to any rolls they're related to. All abilities need to have a value of at least one, therefore acquiring or creating an ability requires Space Points. This doesn't apply to abilities that a character gets because of race or equipment, only those extra abilities that you buy from a list or create yourself.

When creating a character, you can add as many abilities as you can afford in Space Points. When creating your own abilities, the only limit to what you can create is your imagination, as long as they are approved by the SM. Be creative when creating your abilities.

There are two types of abilities: Passive and active. Passive abilities are abilities that are always in effect and don't cost any Fatigue to use, like a heightened sense of smell. Active abilities are abilities which have to be activated for each use and usually cost Fatigue, like blowing bubbles from your rear end which you can then step into and float around in.

Fatigue

Fatigue is a measurement of how worn out and tired your character is. Fatigue is generated from using some abilities, and some weapons give Fatigue to their target instead of Wounds. When your character's Fatigue equals their Vitality, they pass out and can't do anything until they've slept for eight hours. Getting a good night's sleep will remove all Fatigue. Food can also reduce Fatigue a little.

Actions

The action system is the core of the Battletit Galactigate system. This is how all difficult tasks are handled... everything from reprogramming a bot to combat. When performing an action, first determine which attribute best applies to that action. If your character has an ability that also applies to the action, add its level to the attribute being used. This determines the number of action dice you're going to roll.

Once you've determined your action dice, whether it's just your attribute or your attribute + ability, add and subtract any other modifiers there may be. This leaves you with your final action dice, and this is the amount of dice you roll.

For instance, let's say your character wanted to jump over a chair in a smoky bar, and you determined this would use the Speed attribute. If your character had 2 Speed and a Jumping ability of 1, you would add them together, giving you 3. Then let's say the bar is especially dark, giving a -1 penalty, bringing your action dice total down to 2. You would then roll two dice to see how well your character did at jumping over the chair.

If there are enough modifiers to bring your action dice total down to zero or less, you can still attempt the action, you just make a wild shot roll instead. This is explained later.

When rolling your action dice, any die that comes up with an 8 or higher is a success. As long as you roll at least one success, your character succeeds at what they were trying to do. With the above example where your character is trying to jump over the chair, if you roll their two action dice and get a 5 and an 8, that's at least one success so they manage to jump over the chair.

Sometimes certain equipment will give bonuses to your action dice as well. This is especially true of weapons in combat.

Action Difficulty

As in the example above, some actions will have difficulty modifiers associated with them which can either be a bonus or a penalty to represent how easy or difficult the action is. This bonus or penalty is either added to or subtracted from the number of action dice being rolled.

Open Roll

When rolling for anything, anytime you roll a 10, that die counts as a success and you get to roll it again. If it comes up as another 10, it counts as another success and you get to roll it again, for as many times as it comes up 10. This applies to all the dice you roll.

Wild Shot

If you're trying to perform an action and there are enough modifiers to reduce your action dice to zero or less, you roll a wild shot. This means you roll just one die, and you have to get a 10 to have a success. Anything other than a 10 on a wild shot roll isn't a success. If you do roll a 10, it still counts as an open roll, so it counts as a success and you roll again.

Critical Success

A critical success is when you roll five or more successes. Not only did your character succeed at what they were trying to do, but their success goes beyond the norm. The exact results are determined by the SM.

Critical Failure

If you're rolling a wild shot and you roll a 1 on your first roll, it's a critical failure. Your character managed to fail in a spectacular way. Keep in mind this only applies to the first roll of a wild shot roll. The results of this are once again determined by the SM.

Contests

If two characters, forces, or objects are opposing each other in a situation other than combat, such as trying to barter with a shop owner, resist the effects of a drug, or wrestle over a particular object, it's a contest. A roll is made for each person or thing in the contest using either the applicable attribute or the level of the object and whoever gets the most successes wins. If it's a tie, you roll again.

Bending the Dice

After any roll, you can spend one Space Point to turn one of the dice into a 10, giving you a success and allowing you to roll it again.

Combat

Combat is divided into rounds and turns. Each round takes about five seconds. When someone or something takes their turn within a round it's called, surprisingly enough, a turn. To determine the order in which participants act, each participant rolls 1d10 and adds the result to their Speed attribute, then they act in order of highest to lowest. Ties can roll again to resolve the tie.

During their turn each participant can perform one full action. This means if they want to do something that only counts as a half-action, they can do two half-action things in one round, adding up to one full action. If what they want to do takes more than a full action, that activity will be completed in a later round. For instance, if they wanted to wake up their pet Taruvian walloper, and waking it up would take 1 ½ actions, they would have to spend that entire turn trying to wake it up and half of their next turn too, so on their next turn they'd only have a half-action left.

Combat is handled very similarly to actions. First you determine the applicable attribute, Brawn for melee combat and Speed for ranged combat, make sure your target is in range of the weapon you're using, then determine any bonuses and penalties to arrive at your final action dice number, then roll the dice and try to get as many successes as you can.

Each weapon has a damage number. This number is a bonus that's added to your action dice total. Armor has a defense number. This number is a penalty that's subtracted from your action dice total. After arriving at your final action dice, any successes rolled count as one wound and are added to the target's Wounds attribute, increasing it. When a character's or object's Wounds equals their Vitality, they're knocked unconscious or if an object, rendered inoperable.

For instance, let's say a character wants to fire a beam gun. They have 3 Speed and an Aiming special ability of 1, giving them 4 action dice. The beam gun has a damage of 2 which adds to their current action dice, giving them 6. The target is wearing ablative armor with a defense of 3 which is subtracted from the action dice, leaving the attacking character with a total action dice of 3. Three Speed + Aiming 1 + beam gun 2 – target's armor 3 = 3 final action dice. The player rolls and gets 3, 8, 9, giving them two successes, which means the target takes two wounds.

When characters move during combat, they can move a number of yards equal to their Speed attribute.

Cover

During ranged combat, the amount of cover a character takes can increase their Defense.

Vehicles

When a character is piloting a vehicle, the vehicle's Speed score determines how fast the vehicle can move. If complex maneuvers are attempted, an action roll using the character's Speed and whatever appropriate abilities they may have might be required in order to maintain control of the vehicle.

If a character attacks directly from a vehicle using a hand weapon, such as a blaster from the back of an animal or when riding an open-air vehicle like a superscooter, difficulty modifiers could be applied to their roll to account for how bumpy the ride is, which thereby effects their aim.

Some vehicles have vehicle-mounted weapons, and many of these have stabilizers to negate the effects of the movements of the vehicle on their aim. Speed and abilities are used with these sorts of weapons also. Keep in mind most abilities that will give bonuses to using hand weapons don't give bonuses to using vehicle weapons.

If a character is in an open-air vehicle the character can be targeted, though they can receive Defense bonuses for cover depending on how covering the vehicle is. If a vehicle is completely encompassing, then all damage is done to the vehicle.

Scale

If dealing with a large number of dice at once, like when fighting a spaceship or large creature, dice can be scaled down to make rolling easier. To do this, divide the number of dice that need to be rolled by two, dropping any remainder. The resulting number is the number of successes there will be if the scale roll is successful. Then roll 1d10, which is the scale roll. If the roll is a success, then all of the successes achieved from scaling are applied. Otherwise, they aren't.

For instance, if a ship was making an attack and was going to roll 30 dice, you would divide that by two, giving a result of 15. Then the scale roll of 1d10 is made. If the roll is successful, all 15 successes are applied. If the roll is not successful, no successes are applied.

If dice scaling is being used in combat and there's no chance of an attack missing, the scale roll can be skipped and the scaled successes applied.

Unfamiliar Environments

Often if a character or creature is moving through an unfamiliar environment, it will effect how quickly they can move, thereby temporarily reducing their Speed while in that environment. For instance, a water-based creature won't be able to move as quickly on land, and a land-based creature won't be able to move as quickly in water. Also, if someone is floating out in space in a space suit, that would reduce their Speed.

There may be some Abilities which reduce the impact of this, and there also may be some races and creatures that are comfortable in more than one environment.

Advancement

As characters play they're rewarded with Space Points. They can use these to increase their attributes and abilities. Just like with character creation, it's five Space Points for one point of an attribute, and two Space Points for one point of an ability. Space Points can also be used to add new abilities to a character, be it from a list or created by a player, as long as it's approved by the SM.