System Checks – Author Michael Rizban

Making a System Check

The core of The System is the System Check (shortened to Check or SC). A Check is used any time an individual attempts an action of note when the outcome is uncertain, they are threatened by an enemy or otherwise distracted, or there are meaningful consequences for failure. For unimportant or routine tasks and those with no noteworthy penalty for failure, The System simply allows the individual to succeed without making a Check.

You make a System Check by rolling three six-sided dice (3d6) and adding the relevant Attribute, Ability Rank, and bonuses from Augments to the roll. The total result is compared to the Difficulty Target (DT) determined by the SysAdmin. If the total result is equal to or greater than the DT, then the Check is a success. Otherwise, the attempt fails.

Example: Jerra D’cor has a Might of 2 and the Strike Ability at Rank 3. She attacks an enemy with Strike, hacking with her sword. She makes her Check, rolling 3d6 + 2 (her Might) + 3 (her Rank in Strike). The dice land showing faces of 3, 4, and 2, giving her a final total of 12. The SysAdmin compares her results of 12 with the DT. For this attack, the DT is equal to her target’s Evasion, which in this case is a 9. As her result of 12 is higher than the DT of 9, her attack successfully hits, and she will deal damage to her enemy.

Untrained Checks

Fairly often, The System will require a Check to perform an action for which an individual simply does not possess a relevant Ability. Perhaps the individual attempts to balance while walking across a narrow beam or use needle and thread to mend a tear in a favorite shirt. In these cases, that person makes an Untrained Check (or UC).

The main difference from a normal System Check is that no specific Ability is used with an Untrained Check—the individual relies solely on their Attributes. As such, the Ability Rank added to the roll is always 0, and no Augments can be added to the Check or Effect.

For most Untrained Checks, the SysAdmin will determine which Attribute applies to the Check depending on exactly how an individual approaches a task. In the example of crossing a beam mentioned above, the Check may be based on Agility when crossing quickly, Dexterity for a slow, methodical crossing, Might if tightly wrapping arms and legs around the beam and shimmying across, Intellect for determining that there’s a safer place to cross, or Luck for crossing with eyes closed and hoping for the best.

If the task is something unfamiliar to the individual, it’s possible that the Check will be made with Disadvantage or the Difficulty of the task may be increased (See Advantage and Disadvantage and Setting the Difficulty Target below).

Hidden Rolls

In some instances, the SysAdmin will need to make a hidden Check and not reveal the results to the players. Other than these instances, it is recommended that the SysAdmin make all other dice rolls in the open, visible to the other players.

A SysAdmin should make a hidden Check in the following circumstances:

When the character can’t realistically know the outcome of their Check. This primarily relates to an individual attempting to intuit information such as determining if someone is lying, sensing a a hidden motive, or reading the subtext of a conversation. It also applies to searching for hidden objects, people, or information, otherwise divining something unknown, attempting to convey a covert message, convince someone of something, or other situations with a variable degree of success where it’s unreasonable to know precisely how successful the attempt is.

In these situations, the Check should be hidden so that the player is uncertain as to not only whether or not they were successful but also the degree of their success, if any. A good roll will succeed as normal, but a lower roll may result in a partial success, a failure, or even a failure which the player believes is a success.
When making a reactive Check for situations where the player is unaware. This primarily relates to Checks to spot potential danger, such as an enemy waiting in ambush or a tripwire stretched across the path or a suspicious vehicle has been following them. This also applies when making Checks to resist effects such as odorless toxins in the air or psychic manipulation. Asking the players to make a Check reveals too much information that they shouldn’t reasonably have available.

Only if one or more of the players succeed on the Check should the situation can be revealed. Otherwise, they must wait to enjoy the surprise of the final outcome.

Advantage and Disadvantage

Some Abilities, Actions, Augments, or situations may grant an individual an Advantage or inflict Disadvantage on a Check. When you have Advantage, you roll one additional d6 on the Check and discard the lowest die. Disadvantage works the same, except that you instead discard the highest die. Only the three remaining dice are used to obtain the total result of the Check.

It is possible to gain Advantage or Disadvantage multiple times on a single roll, and these instances stack. For example, if a Check has Advantage 3, you would roll three additional dice and discard the three lowest results.

Though uncommon, it is possible to gain both Advantage and Disadvantage on the same Check. In such cases, one instance of Advantage cancels out one instance of Disadvantage, reducing the number of dice rolled. So, if a Check has Advantage 3 and Disadvantage 4, this works out to simply Disadvantage 1. One additional die will be rolled, and the highest result will be discarded.

No matter how many dice are rolled, only three d6s will be selected and applied to the final total for the Check.

Example: After a few back and forth exchanges, Jerra D’cor maneuvers her opponent into an icy patch of ground, forcing him to split his focus between fighting and maintaining balance. Her opponent missed with his last attack. Jerra attacks using her Dueling Ability at Rank 2 and uses the Feint Action, which grants her Advantage against an opponent who just missed an attack against her. In total, she has Advantage 2.

She makes her Check, rolling 5d6 + 2 (her Might) + 2 (her Rank in Dueling). The dice land showing faces of 2, 1, 6, 4, and 3. She discards the two lowest (1 and 2) and adds the remaining three together for a total of 11. This result is higher than her target’s Evasion of 9, resulting in another successful attack.

Using Luck

Using Luck functions similarly to Advantage and Disadvantage. Almost any Ability can substitute Luck in place of the usual Attribute, although the SysAdmin may decide that a particular Check isn’t subject to the whims of fate or doesn’t have enough room for Luck to make a meaningful difference. At other times the SysAdmin might require the use of Luck.

When making a Check using Luck, roll an additional number of d6s equal to your Luck, whether positive or negative. This means Luck 3 and Luck -3 will both add three dice to the Check.

When using a positive Luck score to make a Check, you must keep any 1s or 6s that you roll and discard dice in the following order: 3, 4, 5, 2. If you have more than three dice remaining after discarding, roll the remaining dice again, keeping any 1s or 6s and discarding as above until you are down to exactly three dice then calculate the result as normal. If only 1s or only 6s remain, you do not reroll and instead simply ignore the extra dice, leaving your final roll as either a 3 or 18.

A negative Luck score works in the same way, except that you must keep any 3s or 4s and discard dice in the following order: 6, 1, 2, 5. Again, if more than three dice remain, repeat this process until you have discarded down to exactly three dice. If only 3s or only 4s remain, you do not reroll and instead simply ignore the extra dice, leaving your final roll as either a 9 or 12.

Luck and Advantage

Relying on blind chance negates any Advantage or Disadvantage on a roll. Make the Check using Luck as if neither Advantage nor Disadvantage applied to the Check. However, if your Luck is lower than the Advantage or Disadvantage, it is quite likely that the SysAdmin will deny the use of Luck on a Check. Even a lucky break or colossal blunder may not be enough to overcome the metaphorical stacked deck.

Contested Checks

In some situations, an opponent is actively attempting to resist your actions or directly competing against you. In such cases, the SysAdmin may call for a Contested Check. For such a Check, you must overcome two hurdles: the DT and your opponent’s own Check.

Your Check must exceed the DT as normal for your attempt to be successful. This does not change. However, your opponent will also make their own System Check. The result of your Check is compared to theirs, and the higher Check is considered the winner of the contest.

The classic example for a Contested Check is when you are attempting to hide while an enemy looks for you. Your Check for using stealth would be contested by the enemy’s perception Check.

Passive Contests

Some Contested Checks are made unawares, such as Checks made to determine whether or not the guard notices someone attempting to sneak past them. In this case, the SysAdmin may choose to use a set DT instead of making the Check. In such situations, the SysAdmin should use the average of 10 in place of the dice roll. Each point of Advantage should add 2 to this number to a maximum of 18 while each point of Disadvantage subtracts 2, to a minimum of 3.

Setting the Difficulty Target

Standard Difficulty

Standard Difficulty is considered the norm for any action where an individual has a reasonable chance of failure, such as the normal type of situations where a Check is called for at all. The System assumes that and average individual with average levels of competence facing a task of meaningful difficulty will succeed against Standard Difficulty about half of the time. Of course, training in a particular area greatly increases the chances of success.

The average roll for 3d6 is 10.5, which rounds down to 10. Therefore, The System uses 10 as the basis for calculating the Standard Difficulty. When taking into account Attributes, Ability Ranks, and other bonuses, The System expects the total bonuses to any Check to be equal to about half of an individual’s Level. Therefore, the standard DT for an average task appropriate to a character’s level is 10.5 + 1/2 Level. This is one instance where The System rounds only after adding all of the numbers.

For example, an individual of only 1st Level with only one Rank in one Ability will most likely have a 2 or 3 in the related Attribute for their Ability. This gives them a total of +3 to +4 to their roll. The expected standard DT for their Level is 11, which is 10.5 + 0.5. They have a greater than 50% chance of success, which is expected of someone with the type of specialized training represented by an Ability.

The System assumes that individuals of higher Level haven’t specialized in only a single Ability. (If they have, then they deserve the benefit of being ahead of the curve on Checks.) Not all situations will use Standard Difficulty or will use a modified Standard Difficulty. It is up to the SysAdmin to determine the DT of a Check, and Standard Difficulty is only a measure

Example: Stephan Rudger is a Level 12 Mage who has Mage Blast at Rank 5, Enhance at Rank 3, Herbalism at Rank 2, and Harvesting at Rank 2. At Level 12, The System expects him to be able to succeed on a DT 16 Check about 50% of the time (10.5 + 6, rounded down). Three of his Abilities use his Intellect of 4. Ignoring potential Augments, when Stephan makes a Check using Mage Blast, he has a +9 to the roll, giving him better than average odds of success. His Herbalism and Harvesting both have a +6 to the roll, which puts him exactly where The System expects. Enhance uses his Guile of 2, so he gains only a +5 on the roll, putting him a little behind where The System expects.

Example 2: Charlie Leftinger is a Level 20 Warrior who has Mighty Blow at Rank 7, Surge at Rank 3, Heavy Blades at Rank 2, Light Blades at Rank 2, Prospecting at Rank 2, Mining at Rank 3, and Flower Arranging at Rank 1. Standard Difficulty for Charlie is 20. With a Might of 5 and Agility of 1, he’s fine when making a Mighty Blow (+12) but may struggle when using Light Blades (+3).

Modifying Difficulty

The SysAdmin may choose to adjust the DT from the Standard Difficulty for situations that are particularly difficult or easy. In many cases, this can be handled by granting Advantage or Disadvantage, but modifying the DT is another useful tool for the SysAdmin.

The following guidelines to modifying the DT away from Standard Difficulty apply to individuals who possess at least some training in the Ability being used. Untrained individuals or those with meager Attributes may find tasks more difficult than expected.

-10 or more – Trivial. Tasks that should be trivial. In many cases, a Check may be unnecessary and success simply granted.
-7 to -9 – Simple. Failure is unlikely but not impossible. An individual making this Check should succeed if they have any Ranks in the Ability or a decent Attribute.
-4 to -6 – Easy. Failure is possible but unlikely. This is for mundane tasks that you are used to performing on a regular basis.
-1 to -3 – Favorable. Success is likely, but the chance of failure is significant enough to give more people pause.
0 – Standard Difficulty.
+1 to +3 – Unfavorable. A successful attempt is harder than normal but still easy enough that a competent individual should have no real difficulty.
+4 to +6 – Hard. Challenging with a real chance of failure. Unusual tasks or unexpected situations that can make even an expert start to sweat.
+7 to +9 – Daunting. Only highly specialized masters in their field are likely to find success with any reliability, but even they have a significant chance of failure.
+10 or more – Impossible. Truly difficult tasks that only the most foolhardy would even attempt. It is likely that a Check may not even be allowed, as failure is the only possible outcome.

Optional Rule: Degrees of Success

The System generally does not reward exceptionally good rolls nor punish exceptionally bad rolls with effects beyond the norm for a success or failure. However, some groups may wish to incorporate critical successes and critical fumbles into their games. The following is a suggested method of doing so.

Superior Sixes

When making a successful System Check, each 6 rolled increases the degree of success. For example, an attack that rolls a 6 might deal additional damage, with even greater damage for two or even three 6s would deal even greater damage. When gathering mana for a spell, one or more 6s might increase the amount of mana gathered.

Conversely, with a failed System Check, each 6 rolled might reduce the degree of failure. When climbing a steep precipice, a 6 on a failed roll might turn a guaranteed fall into managing to just catch a ledge.

Onerous Ones

Each 1 rolled increases the degree of failure on a failed System Check. A missed attack with a rolled 1 might leave you unable to act for a round, and multiple 1s might even cause you to drop a weapon or the spell you were attempting to cast to explode in your face or strike an ally instead of an enemy.

Each 1 rolled on a successful Check reduces the success, such as by dealing less damage, making the attack take longer to perform, or increasing the amount of fatigue gained from a stressful action.

Cancelling Dice, or Not

Rolling both a 6 and a 1 causes the two to cancel each other out. It is neither a superior success nor a fumbled failure.

Conversely, the SysAdmin might make the result an improved success and a partial fumble. Perhaps your attack deals additional damage but leaves the weapon lodged in bone, requiring an action to recover it, or you manage to catch a ledge while falling but dislodge rocks that hit those climbing up beneath you.

Remember that this is only a suggestion, and the rules presented here do not inherently support this option. It does, however, allow for interesting outcomes if applied sparingly and judiciously.