Making My Own TTRPG | Part 1

welcome to map crow the rpg art show my name is kyle and today we're making our own rpg this video is brought to you by the generous sponsorship of only crits but more on them a little later for quite a while i have been on the search for the perfect solo dungeon crawling rpg and i haven't quite found it though i have played lots of really fun games in that search rangers of shadow deep four against darkness five parsecs from home all of these are answering this same kind of question in their own ways but i haven't quite found something that suits my lack of attention span and math skills so i've decided to make my own whenever i start a new project i try to find some useful definitions to deploy so that i can organize my work by guiding design principles i spoke about this already a little bit in a previous video called rrpg's art but i'm going to repeat myself just a little bit but in this new context so i really like bernard suits definition of game as a voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles in a dungeon crawler game the obstacles are all around you it is navigating a confusing dungeon it is um fighting monsters it is circumventing fiendish traps so already we have sort of a short list of unnecessary obstacles to attempt to overcome but the characterization of how we attempt to overcome these obstacles is how we interact with the game it is the verb the action word what we do in this game so our verbs for a dungeon crawling game would be attack steal and explore our overall goal is to acquire treasure which is where we get the verb steal and the things that are trying to stop us are an uncertain dungeon layout and the monsters themselves which is where we get attack and explore respectively and let's give ourselves a break let's look at a pre-existing game tunnel goons by nate tremay as a basis for how we will incorporate procedures for overcoming these obstacles this elegant and inspiring game is available on nate's itch page for a pay what you want model but i adore this game i bought it with real monies and i suggest you do the same let's study tunnel goons by looking at its character sheet like many rpgs tunnel goons facilitates different roles by using bonuses on your character sheet added to random dice rolls to show the difference between one character and another and ideally these differences in characters in these numbers will manifest themselves in a difference of playstyle or strategy by marking up the character sheet with the different verbs associated with each slot on it we can learn a lot about what its core design principles are and what kinds of play it is encouraging from its players if a game has hp that means that survival is a priority if you have a brutish strength that means you're probably going to be fighting something if you have a stat called skulker it means you're probably going to be sneaking around and shooting things and the stat area diet is for searching things or using magic scrolls and nearly half of this character sheet is a space to track inventory so carrying stuff around is a big part of this game and of course a space for level so that we can track progress in how we are gaining power going back to my own game let's unpack the verb attack so we want to be able to attack things close up with swords in melee and we want to be able to support ranged attack with bows or magic and i also really enjoy rpgs that make positioning an integral part of how combat is done we can trust that if we attach bonuses to specific items we can encourage behavior that will cause players to favor melee or ranged depending on their character but how do we support position we could factor in modifiers to your roles depending on if you are behind cover or not we could factor in modifiers for if an enemy is up against the wall we could factor in other advantageous positions like being at a higher elevation or having the advantage of numbers in combat with friendly characters next to yours let's take a quick ad break and look at some beautiful dice from only crits only crits is your one stop shop for artisanal dice and dice accessories they also give out a free adventure with your purchase they have sparkly sharp edge dice they have dice with ducks in it they have dice made out of stones they have dice made out of metal they also carry trays and bags as well pop over to only crits using the link in the description below and use promo code crow for 10 off your purchase as a new customer thanks again to only crits for sponsoring this episode and now let's get back to the drawing board glancing back at tunnel goons i can see that we're already going to borrow ability scores and hp but there's one thing that isn't accounted for in tunnel goons that we absolutely need in our more tactical solo game we need a move score if we are moving around discrete concrete spaces instead of playing theater of the mind style we need to know how far people can move and if they will be able to reach these advantageous positions that we've been talking about now you may notice if you've played dungeons and dragons before there is no charisma score talking your way out of problems is not one of the verbs that i'm planning this game around so it's not a stat i want to design the game around the verbs i want people to use and leave out all of the verbs that aren't important to me dungeons and dragons needs to solve any problem potentially my game only needs to solve the problems i want players to solve in tunnel goons you add different bonuses to a roll of two six-sided dice and the total compared to a target number is how you determine success of different actions the higher the target number you're rolling against the less likely it is that your character will be able to successfully accomplish its task but it's important to remember that likelihood does not equal difficulty if it is merely determined on a random dice roll with without you being able to intercede in that by adding bonuses by making different decisions in the game then you may as well just be playing snakes and ladders the intended play style of tunnel goons or dungeons and dragons the narrative is kind of what determines different advantages but in a tactical solo game like ours we need to design for different ways to seize advantage and that's why for our game i am designing so heavily towards position effect on the battlefield in a strategy or skills based game like this one the purpose of putting in obstacles like monsters or traps or confusing dungeon layouts is to test the mastery that the player has over the verbs they are using in the game we want a player that understands when to sneak and when to attack and how to attack effectively to have a better chance of surviving in our game higher stats might change the likelihood of a favorable result but position bonuses reward skill there are probably a couple of other things that i don't realize yet that i need for this game and the easiest way i can think of to find out what those things are is just to start play testing with the little bits that i have now i have written down some notes and made some drawings to clarify my vision but i haven't written down any rules now every game designer is going to have a different approach to this but i don't really enjoy solving the problems of language before i start solving the problems of play later i will write down the rules that describe the kind of play that i was up to in my play test and when i write them down i'll playtest the rules as written and i will keep iterating and changing and reflecting and playing and writing until i have something that i'm happy with so having identified a couple of roadblocks to the procedure of play for our game i have written out a specific turn order first you enter a room then you make a scout roll with a character with the highest dex number if you succeed the heroes continue to sneak until combat starts and if you fail the monsters go first the monsters move in the order of the highest hp and that basically gets us enough to get started with our play test again so let's just say we entered a room let's make a sneak roll our roll of five plus our scout's deck score plus any bonuses from our items still does not meet or exceed our sneaking target number which means the monsters rush in to destroy us the big scary guy with 12 hp rushes over to smash into our knight it seems like if you rush into battle in melee you should get some kind of bonus for that and that again makes initiative really important to win now our knight is going to roll because the monsters don't roll in this game so we are going to add together all of the position bonuses that the monster has and subtract that from the role that our knight makes and with a roll of a six plus bonuses minus all of the position advantages that the monster has this is kind of a lot of math all at once and i can already see that our monster hp is probably a little too high and we need to cut down on the number of position bonuses that we have to figure out or figure out some easier way to track them than just counting on my fingers like a child even so the basic procedure seems solid and it makes sense to me so we can continue to move forward with our play test after playing a few more turns it seems like now is a great time to write down some notes about the experience that i can adjust for in future iterations but i am also encouraged by the progress that i have so far once i write out these rules i'm sure i can get even further with my play test and discover even more things that i need to add in a lot of the gameplay that is based around exploration hasn't even been worked out yet but the gameplay that is designed around the verbs attacking and stealing is feeling really good right now i think that just about does it for this round of play testing for this game and i think that also does it for this episode if you would like to see more videos of this design process for this game and seeing how i design games around central verbs let me know in the comments and also let me know if you have any questions if there's anything i can make more clear in any case when the game is finished it will be posted to my patreon where i have been making all kinds of digital terrain and minis available for my lovely backers but until next time my friends farewell

Channel: Map Crow

Views: 90,397

Keywords: drawing, art, tutorial, ttrpg, rpg, dnd, game design, artist

Id: FIFjctoORxQ

Length: 12min 13sec (733 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 19 2022