(Rules - Rad) Radonite Core Rules

* Part 1, Dice System
* Part 2, Stats
* Part 3, Combat
* Part 4, Items
* Part 5, Vehicles
* Part 6, Magic and Flight

# **Part 1, Dice System**

This version of Duality will have characters rolling a pool of cubic six-sided dice, D6’s, to decide the fate of actions. A 5 or a 6 is a ‘success’ or a ‘hit’, and a roll will require between 1 and 10 of these to be successful, depending on difficulty. An easy action might only take 1, 2, or 3, while a hard one would require 6 or 7, and a task of legendary difficulty would require 9 or 10.

If a roll gets at least two more hits than needed, this is a critical success, and something extra positive happens. This is usually up to the GM, and they will try to make it interesting and dynamic, but some equipment also grants small guaranteed modifiers to the effects of crits.

However, if at least half of the dice in the pool rolled by a character come up as a 1, this is a critical failure. Not only does this guarantee fail the action, *even if* the remaining dice roll a success or even a crit, something else negative happens. This again will be something decided by the DM, and will cause a dynamic change to the situation beyond simple numerical penalties.

# **Part 2, Stats**

All entities that can perform actions, namely living creatures, AI, robots, vehicles, and status-unclear otherworldly entities, have 4 stats. These stats form the base pool for any skill roll, and are further modified by equipment or other upgrades. They are:

**Agility:** This is for actions that require acting fast and precisely, reflexes, control, and bursts of speed or power.

**Resilience:** This is for actions that require a little more force, but less finesse. Endurance, durability, long-term potential physically.

**Stability:** This is for confidence, assuredness, force of will in terms of mental security, and intellect or computational power. For digital entities, it’s also a measure of digital security and reliability of systems, likeliness of random failure, and long-term durability under digital attack.

**Influence:** This is for force of personality, charm, and persuasiveness. For digital entities, it’s also a measure of the quality of life offered to users in design, personality and unique flair in design, and overall appeal of the package deal.

All entities with the rough equivalent abilities to the average person would have stats between 1-5, with a pool of 10 points spread between those four stats. That is, really: entities that are, among their type, not very skilled, exceptional, durable, or interesting. Some beings are gifted with much greater means; the most popular star a whole world has produced may have an influence of 7, some tiny robots may have AGI as high as 7, or 8, while a massive alien with subdermal ceramic plates might have a RES of 9.

Some things, such as the combat effects of drug side effects, different kinds of chemical explosives, tech being hacked, magic effects and side effects, can reduce those stats; sometimes temporarily, sometimes permanently. If a stat reaches 0 or below, the entity is to be considered fully nonfunctional until some effort is made to heal, repair, or restore it, in whatever way most appropriate. And AGI of 0- might mean complete damage to muscle fibers or GPU cores, massive full-system paralysis, lethargy, or otherwise, while an INF of 0- might mean complete loss of self, a permanent state of ego death or otherwise any major outworld responsiveness, but otherwise retain theoretical intelligence.

Likewise, some things can boost those stats. Usually temporary upgrades, often from battlefield use of drugs, medical stims, gene or cybernetic abilities, magic, and the like, but sometimes even permanent ones, even from the same sources. The absolute upper value of a stat is 10; no temporary or permanent buff can bring the stat above this at any point. Bonuses to things other than the value of the stat can still apply.

# **Part 3, Combat**

Combat is similarly very simple. Very small entities, those considered handheld or smaller, tend to have 3-5 HP, while those on the scale of people or semi-large machines have 10 HP, small vehicles might have 20 or 30, and large vehicles like ships have around 100 HP, at class 1. Hand-held weapons and physical attacks by living things or robots will deal between 1 and 10 damage, smaller vehicle weapons will deal between 3 and 15, and large vehicle weapons between 8 and 25.

Armour for characters will have a rating like “1D6 - 3”. This means that the character will roll a single D6, subtract from the result (3), and that remaining number, minimum of (0), is the armour's effectiveness. Armour effectiveness is then simply subtracted from that damage roll; the next source of valid damage for the armour gets a new armour effectiveness roll.

For example: an attack does (4) damage, the D6 rolls a (5), minus (3) equals (2) armour effectiveness. Of that (4) damage, only (2) reduces HP. The best armour will have a “1D6 - 1” rating, the worst is “1D6 - 5”. On occasion, things like physical shields might grant a flat (+1) to armour; this means all damage is reduced by one, usually before any other math is done, but as is logical for the situation. Other things, like energy barrier styles of shields, might grant a small amount of temporary HP that is remove by damage before armour comes into play, usually restoring quickly.

Vehicles, however, always have flat amounts of armour. This is because, ignoring literal armour on many, there is often a lot of empty space before true vital areas are hit in vehicles; door panels, air pockets, non-vital components, and these tend to take up a lot of the energy of small attacks. Damaging things like vehicles without large weapons usually requires being clever and finding a different solution than direct combat.

When an entity reaches 0 HP, it is destroyed; living creatures die, robots overload important circuits and cease functioning in a shower of sparks, and vehicles tend to explode. However, anything with a fear of death or other basic survival mechanism will likely try to disengage from combat before that point, often caving to the whims of their attacker to negotiate a ceasefire. Everyone's learned by now that life's not like the holos; fighting to the death usually just isn't worth it.

Unless otherwise specified by an item, two actions can be taken every turn, with order of go during each turn being decided by Agility rolls. One of those actions is using an item, often to attack, but maybe to drink, throw, or cast; another is to move. Each movement allows you to change your range category to or from a target by 1 step, the range categories being close, short, medium, long, and Line Of Sight, although you cannot move to LOS. If a target is in short range, you can move towards them at a speed that would keep you prepared in combat but also bring you into close range, essentially melee range. However, if they are at long range, you can break into a sprint, avoiding sniper fire from their direction and close a considerable distance to get into medium range.

You can also choose to move directly away from an enemy using thew same rules, as can you abandon combat altogether. When you can move after being long range from all other combatants, you have disengaged from combat. If you want to move specific locations, short range amounts of movement per action, but the GM may have good reasons for why certain short trips aren't possible, such as covering fire.

For example, a turn might consist of moving from close range to short, out of a deadly alien’s claw range, and firing with a laser pistol that has a range of short. Every step you aim above or below your weapon’s range adds 1 required hit to the difficulty of the attack, which is otherwise one third of the sum of your target’s Agility and Resilience, rounded up, max of 10. If a target’s stats are so high that hitting them isn’t practical, or sometimes even possible, you may have to find a way to weaken them, first!

# **Part 4, Items**

Next, items. Items and equipment are at the core of this game. They can be almost anything that has a use, and that you feel like carrying around. Items will always have three things: a rating between 1 and 5, a value, and special features.

The rating of an item is very important, and broadly represents the quality of that item. Tier 1 is a cheap brand, beat up dug out of a box. Tired. Functional, for now, but tired. Tier 3 is the average model, new or gently used. It's in good shape, has no major defects, could be a loved personal piece for years, but not outstanding. Tier 5 is top of the line quality, absolutely the best money can buy; if you want more you'll need fancier models all together. Ideally, you always want to find higher ratings of useful items, if you can.

When you make a roll of any kind, you may add the ratings of any items you have handy as dice to the pool for your roll, if you can explain how they’re useful, in a manner that the GM finds sufficiently convincing and fun for the overall story. It's a game of story building; get creative and think outside the box to win the day. For example, you make an Agility attack. You may add the rating of the pistol you are using to your Agility, for obvious reasons, but you are also wearing a helmet that has targeting software, so you may add that. Your GM may even let you argue that the stiff plate armour you’re wearing steadies your aim as a shock absorber, and you can add that. But remember how many free hands you have…

Value is somewhat obvious. They say everything in the galaxy is for sale, and for the most part that's true. The vast majority of transactions in the galaxy take place typically with Credits, a currency backed by all major factions. Higher ratings of items will be exponentially more expensive, and items with longer lifetimes, more complex or expensive construction, or combat gear in general, all will also suffer assorted kinds of markups. Some things can get very expensive; there are pieces of handheld gear more costly than some vehicles, it all just depends on what it's worth to you.

Special features vary. For weapons, there will be a range, damage, and stat they use, if nothing else. For armour, an armour rating. But all items can have other special features. Anything that can be hacked will have a Security rating, which is the target number of hits someone would need to disable it. Some may even give you special abilities, and those will be described in the special features.

For example, a grappling hook may have a special feature of allowing you to climb up to short range on sheer surfaces, or a medkit may have a feature of allowing you to restore 1 point of lost AGI from injury per use. The possibilities are endless! What items exist, their cost, and their exact function is up to your GM, but feel free to try to seek out specific items to gain specific abilities; that could itself lead to an interesting story…

# **Part 5, Vehicles**

There's a lot of complex situations that come up with vehicles, and it's hard to cover it all, so the GM will have to make a lot of judgement calls. However, some of the most important rules and situations are covered here.

Like any entity, vehicles have an HP, max and current. This covers the state your vehicle is in, and if it reaches 0, you'll be looking for valuable scrap, at best. Most vehicles have at least a little static armour, which reduces incoming damage by a flat value. Vehicles also have the same four stats as all other entities. Depending on the situation, the GM might call for a roll with a character's stats, or maybe the vehicle stats, or maybe it will be up to the character. Only equipment that affects the source of the stats is useful; if rolling with vehicle stats, the items that the pilot has equipped cannot affect the roll, bonus wise.

In combat, all vehicles involved in a combat situation will compare their speeds. The slowest vehicle(s) will be considered at the 'center' of the combat arena, moving towards whatever destination they choose, with combat happening in standard ranges around this center point, like planets in rings around a star. The difference in speed between a vehicle and the speed of the center vehicle(s) in combat is the number of ranges available to it for move around as part of combat, starting close with 0 and 1, then short and close with 2, then medium, short, and close with a difference of 3... From there, order of go is fastest vehicle to slowest, looping that way every round.

Like with characters, a vehicle has 2 actions, and the primary uses are (Attack),(Defend),(Move),(Dodge),and (Flee). Rounds last for 12 seconds, rather than 6, leaving 5 rounds per minute.

When a vehicle uses an attack action, crew members must roll to determine the damage they're able to deal through skilled operation of the vehicle's systems, up to the vehicle's Damage Potential. Every successful hit on rolls by crew members brings total damage closer to that theoretical max potential, although at different rates for different classes of vehicle. The Stat rolled is up to the GM, but whether its the ship's or character's stats is up to the player. Only one character can roll per crew station available on the ship; others will have to help in other ways.

Class 0 vehicles, a crew member helping meets (10%) per hit. Crits meet (20%) and increase the max by the same.

Class 1 vehicles, a crew member helping meets (3) of the DMG Pot per hit. Crits meet (5) and increase the max by the same.

Class 2 vehicles, a crew member helping meets (8) of the DMG Pot per hit. Crits meet (12) and increase the max by the same.

Class 3 vehicles, a crew member helping meets (15) of the DMG Pot per hit. Crits meet (20) and increase the max by the same.

Class 4 vehicles, a crew member helping meets (35) of the DMG Pot per hit. Crits meet (50) and increase the max by the same.

The range modifier:

Every range increment beyond your vehicle's optimal engagement range that a target is, your DMG Pot drops by (25%), rather than affecting the difficulty of rolls.

Characters should be encouraged to think in this way when assisting with the functions of a vehicle in combat; one round is twelve seconds, or four actions to them. What does the character do with that much time that helps out the effort that the character is focused towards? They don't need to describe every action unless the character is involved in their own separate combat, just general ideas.

When a vehicle uses a defense action, it works very similarly. At exactly the same rates, crew members can roll to meet the Defense Potential of a vehicle; focusing shield projectors manually against the highest-risk incoming attacks, operating point-defense turrets to shoot down incoming explosive warheads, diverting power from non-vital systems to boost combat strength, or changing the angles of deflector panels, all add to defense potential. Defense potential functions like temporary vehicle HP, forming a pool that attack damage dealt through the DMG Pot of other vehicles pulls from before reaching armour and HP. Def Pot is not affected by speed differences or range.

Finally, when a vehicle uses a dodge action, it very simply applies its current speed as a penalty against the number of hits rolled by crewmembers of attacking vehicles, essentially applying 'negative' non-crit hits. This effect lasts until the beginning of that vehicle's next turn.

For larger vehicles, potentials will be met mostly by NPCs, unless characters are specifically lending their effort for an exceptional result, and depending on crews you can expect average results from them.

Vehicles can disengage from a combat situation by rolling against the speed of any vehicles that are going to try to stop them. First, find the difference between the speed of the pursuing vehicle in the current contest, and the speed of the attempting escapee, minimum of (0). If the number of hits rolled by the fleeing vehicle to escape is higher than that difference by at least (1), it gets away from that specific pursuer of the potential list for some time. Getting away from a big group may take several rounds, as rolls may not always be in the escapee's favor.

In terms of duration of escape: If that difference is only (1), the fleeing ship only escapes for (1) minute, unless it is not perused after the initial escape. If the difference is (2), the window is (10) minutes, (3) is (1) hour, and (4+) is truly, completely escaped, until something change in the story. If some vehicles are shaken by the escapee, but not all, the simplest thing to do is split those ships off into a new combat situation.

# **Part 6, Magic and Flight**

These are, to a degree, optional rules. Having a main species with access to magic and/or flight is something you can easily control by adding or removing access to spell and flight cards, which are two kinds of items.

If you intend to keep them in, they are very simple. Each spell or flight maneuver has a list of short descriptions with paired mana and stamina costs. Mana is simply the sum of a character's Stability and Influence, and is drained by using magic. Stamina is simply the sum of a character's Agility and Resilience, and is drained by flying. Any spell or flight maneuver has the option to be used with between 0 and 5 mana/stamina. If 0 mana/stamina is spent, the effect is an automatic success. For every mana/stamina spent, it requires a single additional success on a matching stat roll to be fully effective. A character must decide how much they're willing to spend to the effect they need, and given they actually have the card, they may mark down the mana/stamina drain and move forward with the effect, assuming they passed the roll. If not, the mana/stamina is usually still spent, and something bad sometimes happens... All spell and flight cards take 1 action to use.

Mana and stamina both are refilled by 1 point every time the character in question has a critical success on any dice roll. It cannot go over max, however.