05. System

5. System

The entire purpose of a game system is to answer two questions: “How do the players determine whether they succeed or fail?” and “How well do they succeed or fail?” Basic Roleplaying answers those questions with a clean and intuitive system using dice rolls to simulate the probability of whether an action succeeds or fails, and qualities of success to determine a range of possible outcomes.

Routine actions in routine situations without challenge should almost always succeed. However, when the action becomes dramatic or extraordinary, it’s time to roll dice for the resolution. You will want to know if skills succeed when danger threatens, or if they fail miserably in the face of stress. Dice allow crises and decision points to be resolved impartially without the constant need for intervention of your gamemaster.

Some skills, especially weapon skills, are inherently dramatic and dangerous, and always are rolled for, as are accidents such as falls. All rolls to determine success or failure use percentage dice (D100s), with lower being better. Other types of dice establish the damage done by various weapons or determine other supporting information. Chapter 6: Combat discusses attacking and defending in combat. Chapter 7: Spot Rules contains guidelines to cover a variety of conditions and situations.

Usually, your gamemaster tells you when to roll and what sort of roll to make— whether it be a skill roll, a resistance table roll, a characteristic roll, etc., but this chapter is useful for everyone who wants to know how the game works.

Actions

Regardless of genre, all good stories (and roleplaying adventures) have one thing in common: conflict. Characters are called upon to accomplish all sorts of things against the odds, from finding and interpreting clues to overcoming enemies in deadly combat.

Percentile rolls determine the success or failure of actions whose outcome is in doubt. Other dice can help define the results of a roll (damage, etc.), but percentile rolls are the core of the system. To see if an action succeeds, roll D100 and compare the result to the chance, determined by the type of roll and its potential modifiers. If the percentile roll is equal to or less than the target, the action succeeds. Rolls higher than the chance of success fail.

Automatic or Impossible Actions

Not all actions require a die roll. Routine activities attempted under normal conditions should generally succeed unless they’re outside the ability of the characters. No D100 roll is necessary for any action your gamemaster deems simple or routine, without challenge or conflict.

On the other hand, your gamemaster may decide that truly overwhelming tasks, like performing heart surgery without medical training or building a computer out of coconuts are beyond the abilities of even the most accomplished experts. If your gamemaster rules that a task is Impossible, no die roll will be sufficient—all attempts fail.

Evaluating Success or Failure

Sometimes your character’s efforts can have very different results: a good toss at darts will hit the board, while a lucky or exceptional throw hits the bull’s-eye. There are five degrees of success for any type of action roll. Ranked from worst to best, they are as follows:

Fumble

Bad luck or incompetence sometimes conspire to produce the worst possible result, a spectacular failure called a fumble. The chance of fumbling an action roll equals 5% (1/20th) of the chance of failure, usually in the 96–00 range. A roll of 00 is always a fumble, no matter what the skill rating is. Fumbles never yield any beneficial results, and always end up impeding or even harming your character and/or allies through disastrous or unintended results. Chapter 3: Skills and Chapter 6: Combat discuss the specific consequences of fumbled rolls.

Failure

Rolls higher than the base chance fail. Unless an action is Automatic, there is always some chance of failure: no matter how high the modified base chance, rolls fail on results of 96 or higher. Some failures cost nothing more than perhaps a little dignity, while others can be expensive in time, money, or physical damage. See Chapter 3: Skills for the consequences of failed rolls. The exception are resistance rolls, where a difference of 10 characteristic points is enough to make only a roll of 00 a failure.

Success

Any roll equal to or below the base chance qualifies as a success. Successes accomplish the action with average results. Weapon skills that achieve a success inflict the listed damage dice, and other skills have the results suggested in Chapter 3: Skills.

Special Success

Some results are better than average and yield extra benefits. Actions achieve special success if the roll is equal to or less than 1/5 the skill rating. In combat, an attack that rolls a special success can inflict a knockdown or impale based on the type of weapon (see Chapter 6: Combat for additional detail), while the skill descriptions in Chapter 3: Skills provide guidance for special successes.

Critical Success

Sometimes your character will perform an action so well they achieve extraordinary results. Rolls that are equal to or less than 1/20 of the skill rating are a critical success. A critical success yields the best of all possible results. Weapons that critically hit utterly bypass the target’s armor and do maximum damage (plus the normally rolled damage modifier); while skill rolls achieve far better results than normal. Refer to Chapter 3: Skills to for suggested critical results.

Skill Results Table

These are the ranges for critical success, special success, and fumbles. The results for special successes incorporate the number range for critical successes. Whenever a roll result is in the range of both a critical and special success, the results of the critical success (if appropriate) should be applied, not both.

Base Chance	Critical	Special	Fumble
01–05	01	01	96–00
06–10	01	01–02	96–00
11–15	01	01–03	96–00
16–20	01	01–04	96–00
21–25	01–02	01–05	97–00
26–30	01–02	01–06	97–00
31–35	01–02	01–07	97–00
36–40	01–02	01–08	97–00
41–45	01–03	01–09	98–00
46–50	01–03	01–10	98–00
51–55	01–03	01–11	98–00
56–60	01–03	01–12	98–00
61–65	01–04	01–13	99–00
66–70	01–04	01–14	99–00
71–75	01–04	01–15	99–00
76–80	01–04	01–16	99–00
81–85	01–05	01–17	00
86–90	01–05	01–18	00
91–95	01–05	01–19	00
96–00	01–05	01–20	00
101–105	01–06	01–21	00
106–110	01–06	01–22	00
111–115	01–06	01–23	00
116–120	01–06	01–24	00
Each +5	Etc.	Etc.	00

Skill Rolls

Most actions your character attempts are resolved with skill rolls. Here, the percentile roll uses your character’s rating in the appropriate skill as the chance of success. Any skill which normally has a base chance of 5% or higher always succeeds on a roll of 01–05 chance of success, even if difficulty, conditional modifiers, or other factors reduce the skill rating below 5%. See Modifying Action Rolls. See Chapter 3: Skills for more information about each skill.

Characteristic Rolls

Some actions are not easily linked to a specific skill: pulling oneself up a rope, for example. For these situations, use a characteristic roll, with a chance of your character’s characteristic multiplied by a number. CON, INT, DEX, and CHA are common characteristics to use, and most characteristic rolls have a ×5 multiplier. Your base characteristic rolls were defined in character creation. Depending on the difficulty of the action, your gamemaster may use a higher or lower multiplier. See Difficulty Modifiers.

Resistance Rolls

Some actions require more than skill or natural ability: obstacles must be overcome to succeed. In these cases, gamemasters should refer to the resistance table and call for a resistance roll. Resistance rolls never involve skills, instead pitting characteristics or other measurable quantities against each other. See Opposed Skill Rolls for ways to handle skill vs. skill contests.

To make a resistance roll, compare the active factor to the passive factor on the resistance table. The active factor is the party or force trying to influence the passive factor. The following are all examples of resistance rolls:

• Potency 17 venom (active) poisons your character with a CON 15 (passive). The venom is trying to inflict damage on your character, so the venom is active.
• Your character has STR 18 (active) and tries to move a SIZ 25 (passive) boulder. Your character is trying to move the boulder, so their STR is active.

The base chance of a resistance roll equals 50% + (active characteristic × 5) – (passive characteristic × 5). If the active and passive factors are equal, the active factor has a 50% chance of success. Every point the active factor exceeds the passive factor by modifies the chance of success by +5%, while passive factors higher than active factors modify the base chance by –5% for every point of difference. Differences of 10 points or more result in automatic success or failure, though your gamemaster may allow a roll of 01 or 00 to succeed or fail, respectively, where results would otherwise be automatic.

Some specific uses of the resistance table include:

• Power Points vs. Power Points: Powers that attempt to influence or control a target often involve contests of power points: your character’s current power point total must overcome the target’s current power points for the power to take effect.
• Potency vs. CON: All diseases and poisons are measured in terms of Potency (POT) and match this rating against the target’s CON to determine the effects. Depending on the venom or illness, even a failed roll can impair the target.
• POW vs. POW: A classic contest of willpower. In addition to winning the resistance roll, success in a POW vs. POW contest gives the active character an opportunity to raise their POW score if they win vs. a higher POW opponent.
• STR vs. STR: Used in arm wrestling, as well as attempts to force open a stuck door or bend an iron bar. These contests involve inflexible obstacles, not heavy ones.
• Damage vs. CON: Knockout attacks and blows to the head match the rolled damage against the CON of the target to determine if the target is stunned or knocked out.
• STR+SIZ vs. STR+SIZ: Overbearing attacks attempt to use the mass and strength of the attacker to knock down the target.

Your gamemaster may wish to always allow for a chance of failure when a result of 00 is rolled, regardless of skill rating. Similarly, a 01 may be a success, even if improbable, though this should be within your character’s capabilities.

The Resistance Table

The top axis is for the active characteristic and the left axis is for the passive characteristic.

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23	24
1	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
2	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
3	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
4	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
05	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
06	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
07	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
08	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
09	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-	-
10	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-	-
11	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-	-
12	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-	-
13	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-	-
14	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	-
15	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	85
16	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90
17	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85
18	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80
19	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75
20	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70
21	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	-	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65
22	-	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60
23	-	-	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55
24	-	-	-	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	05	10	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50

For success, roll 1D100 equal to or less than the indicated number. Changes below 05% are in the range of automatic failure and over 95% in the range of automatic success.

Critical Results, Special Successes, and Fumbles on Resistance Rolls

Usually resistance rolls have yes/no results—success or failure—but your gamemaster may choose to characterize results more granularly in the cases of a special or critical success (see below), or a drastic failure with a fumble. The nature of this is up to your gamemaster, using the guidelines for levels of success and failure with skills.

Special Skill Rolls

Special circumstances may require something other than a standard skill roll. These cases arise when two characters work together, work against each other, or attempt to do two things at once.

Cooperative Skill Rolls

Two or more characters can attempt to work together on an action, if reasonable. This is a type of augment. Your gamemaster may impose restrictions on how many characters can contribute to a particular activity, as it may be limited by physical or other practical concerns. Some tasks simply cannot be assisted, depending on circumstances.

Whenever working together on an action, pick one character as the lead. All the other characters pitching in should make skill rolls. Take the best result or a fumble, if one occurs.

• Critical Success: Modify the primary character’s skill rating by +50%.
• Special Success: Modify the skill rating by +30%.
• Success: Modify the skill rating by +20%.
• Failure: If no helpers succeeded, the primary character’s skill rating is modified by –10%.
• Fumble: A fumble from any helper is so distracting that the primary skill is modified by –50%.

One reason for cooperative skill use is to increase the chance of the primary character’s success, as well as the chance of special and critical successes.

If the primary skill roll is successful, everyone involved who made a successful skill roll can make an experience check. If not, no one gets an experience check.

Another reason for cooperative skill use is when direct assistance is not possible, such as helping provide guidance from afar.

For example, *your character (Pilot 25%) is at the controls of a small airplane, trying to land after the pilot was shot. An ally on the ground with Pilot 65% is in an air traffic control tower. Over the radio, she provides guidance for piloting and landing. Even though she is nowhere near a plane, the ally makes a successful Pilot roll, raising your character’s effective Pilot skill by +20%, from 25% to 45%. *

Opposed Skill Rolls

Sometimes two characters use skills in direct opposition to each other.

For example, your character hides in a thick hedge while attempting to break into an enemy outpost. An alert sentry passes by, searching for intruders. Will your character elude notice? In this case, the sentry’s Sense skill is pitted against your character’s Hide skill.

When two skills are opposed, both characters roll against their respective skills. The character that achieves the highest degree of success wins the contest. However, if the loser’s skill roll was successful, they modify the winner’s degree of success, shifting it downward one degree for every degree of success they achieve above failure. If both parties achieve the same degree of success, the higher die roll wins the contest, giving the advantage to characters with higher skill ratings.

For example, your character’s Hide skill is 65, while the sentry has a Sense skill of 78. You roll a 47, a success. The sentry rolls a 13, or a special success! The sentry wins the contest, so they are alerted to your character’s presence. Your character’s successful roll downgrades the sentry’s result from a special success to a normal success. In this case, your gamemaster rules that the sentry catches a glimpse of your character but does not pick out any of their identifying features. If the sentry had rolled a 30, your character would have eluded notice: both had successes, but your character’s normal success beats the sentry’s normal success when it comes to using Hide versus Sense.

Opposing Skll Roll Systems

There are many ways to handle opposing rolls, and the following alternate methods allow for your gamemaster to pick the one they prefer, instead of the default presented above.

Opposed Skills Using Highest Successful Result

Let everyone involved in the opposed check roll as normal (with any applicable modifiers) and compare the results. The highest successful result rolled that is not a critical or special success is the winner. For example, if two characters have the same skill rating of 87% and one rolls an 86 and the other rolls a 22, the roll of 86 is the winner. Both rolls are successful, but one has a higher result than the other.

The higher a character’s skill at an attempted action, the greater the chance they will defeat less skilled (but still successful) opponents. Ties are resolved by comparing unmodified skill ratings, with the higher skill rating being the winner.

An alternate and more complex method is to make rolls as normal and then take the result of the successful roll and subtract it from the modified skill rating. The character achieving the highest difference between the skill rating and their roll is the winner.

Opposed Skill Subtraction

In an opposed skill roll, one skill is designated as the active/offensive skill and the other as the passive/defensive skill. First, make a skill roll for the passive character; if the roll is successful, subtract the full value of the that character’s skill rating from the active/attacking skill’s rating. If the passive skill roll fails, the attacking skill is unmodified.

A passive fumble turns the attacker’s roll into an Easy roll. If the passive skill is higher than the active skill, the attacker still has a default 5% chance for success with any skill rating of 5% or higher.

Opposed Skill Rolls Using the Resistance Table

Actions involving two opposing skills can be resolved using the resistance table. Divide the attacking and defending skill ratings by 5 (rounding normally) and resolve it as a single roll contest on the resistance table.

This method generates different results from the others and denies one party any roll at all. If using this method, allow the players to make rolls whenever possible, with the nonplayer characters being ‘passive’ on the resistance table.

Combined Skill Rolls

In some cases, your character’s actions can be complicated by having to do two things at once. Trying to spot a tiny detail while driving a car, shooting a bow from horseback, or climbing a tree without making a sound are all examples. In such cases, your gamemaster can link two skills together in one roll, using the lower skill rating as the base chance. If the roll succeeds, your character accomplishes both tasks. A failed roll that is below the second skill rating can be treated as a partial success.

Using the examples above, the driver might miss the detail but avoid a driving mishap, the horseman stays in the saddle but misses their shot, and the tree climber reaches the upper branches but makes noise. If both rolls fail, the consequences can be more extreme.

Make an experience check for the skill or skills that are successful.

Modifying Action Rolls

Some actions are easier or harder than others, and sometimes challenging circumstances or lucky breaks help or hinder a character. Skill ratings are often modified based on their circumstances.

There are two main ways action rolls are modified: difficulty modifiers and situational modifiers.

Difficulty Modifiers

Some actions are simple enough that even an unskilled person succeeds without much effort, while others are challenging enough to give an expert pause. When an action itself is easier or more challenging than usual, adjust the skill rating by a difficulty modifier. The standard difficulty levels are: Automatic, Easy, Average, Difficult, and Impossible. These levels can apply to skill rolls, characteristic rolls, or similar rolls. Resistance rolls inevitably imply a level of conflict, with an opposing force, so they are not modified in this way.

Your gamemaster is the ultimate authority about when an action receives a difficulty modifier.

Automatic Actions

Any activity that is so mundane, routine, or under the most favorable of circumstances and without any drama or conflict can be assumed to be Automatic, with no roll necessary to determine whether it succeeds. Everyday physical and intellectual actions attempted under average conditions always succeed, unless there is some reason they should carry the chance of failure. Your character should be able to perform Automatic actions at reasonable levels of competency in their chosen profession without needing to roll each time they wish to succeed—rolling for skills are at dramatic or difficult times, when success or failure is of importance to survival or destiny. Automatic skill use never yields an experience check.

Easy Actions

Some actions are Easy, even for the untrained. Shooting a target at point-blank range, climbing a tree with many handholds, or recalling the most fundamental points of an academic discipline are all Easy actions. For an Easy action, double the skill rating. Easy characteristic rolls use a multiplier of ×10 or double the normal characteristic roll. However, success at an Easy skill roll does not merit an experience check.

Average Actions

Most actions fall within this category. If a skill or characteristic roll doesn’t have a modifier before—such as an Easy Listen roll_—_assumed it’s Average. Use the base rating for Average actions, though they may have circumstance modifiers. Average characteristic rolls use a multiplier of ×5 and are the default on your character sheet.

Difficult Actions

Fighting an opponent you can’t see, climbing a sheer surface, or remembering obscure scientific minutiae are all Difficult tasks. To determine the skill rating or characteristic rating for a Difficult action, divide the appropriate skill or characteristic roll in half (round up).

Impossible Actions

As described above, truly overwhelming or ridiculous actions, like performing heart surgery without surgical tools or building a computer out of coconuts are beyond the abilities of even the most accomplished experts. These are Impossible tasks. All attempts fail, no matter how well the player rolls. Your gamemaster may allow a flat 01% chance of success, depending on the action being attempted, though it is only suggested if the chance of success is within reason, however improbable, the equivalent of a one-in-a-million lucky guess or freak occurrence.

Situational Modifiers

Special or unusual circumstances can affect any skill rating for better or worse. Dim light, loud noises, distractions, rain, or a lack of proper tools provide penalties to skill ratings, while exceptional tools or ideal conditions might provide a bonus. Whenever external factors might affect your character’s performance of an action, your gamemaster should weigh the circumstances and apply one or more situational modifiers to the base chance.

The difference between difficulty modifiers and situational modifiers is that difficulty modifiers are usually relating to the character and the attempted action, while situational modifiers are very specifically related to the subject of the action, or to external forces or influences.

If several conditions apply to a given action, apply them judiciously. Any situational modifier is applied after a skill is modified due to being Difficult or Easy. This way, the modifiers are not doubled or halved. However, any modifiers that are ‘permanent’, such as the bonus to Brawl from the Unarmed Combat power, are figured into the skill rating before it is doubled or halved. These sorts of modifiers are considered integral to the skill and are modified for difficulty along with the rest of the skill rating.

Take care not to get bogged down in the minutiae of determining situational modifiers. Your gamemaster should assess the severity of circumstances, determine the overall modifier, and let you roll as quickly as possible. Situational modifiers are intended to be tools that add drama to tense situations, not strict guidelines or a checklist attempting to simulate absolute realism.

Situational Modifiers Table

Condition	Description	Modifier
Task Complexity	Unfathomably complex with no apparent solution or guidance	–50%
	No clear solvable condition and/or needlessly complex	–20%
	Relatively straightforward, the solution somewhat apparent	+20%
	Simple, with an obvious solution	+50%
Equipment	No equipment when equipment is required	–50%
	Poor or improvised equipment	–20%
	High-quality equipment and superior supplies	+20%
	Advanced or high-tech equipment and supplies	+50%
Environment	Distracting environment, highly unstable ground, pitch black, stormy, etc.	–50%
	Unpleasant or unsanitary conditions, unsteady footing, darkness, bad weather, etc.	–20%
	Favorable conditions, good footing, plenty of space, relative quiet, etc.	+20%
	Pristine or immaculate environment ideally suited for the task at hand	+50%
Familiarity	Completely alien and beyond human experience	–50%
	Strange and using unfamiliar principles	–20%
	Relatively well-known subject matter	+20%
	Routine and completely familiar	+50%
Range	Far beyond the normal range	–50%
	Outside the range of comfort	–20%
	Well within range	+20%
	Perfectly placed and ideally situated for the attempt	+50%
Time	Nowhere near enough time to perform the task	–50%
	Rushed and stressed about it	–20%
	Plenty of time	+20%
	Activity can be done at leisure, with contemplation and deliberation	+50%
Understanding	No common means of interaction with subject	–50%
	Limited methods of communication available	–20%
	Subject is familiar and amenable to interaction	+20%
	Subject well-known, enthusiastic about interaction	+50%

Skill rating over 100% (Option)

For games using epic or superhuman power levels, your gamemaster may allow your characters (and nonplayer characters) to have skill rankings above 100%. This heightened competency allows for greater chances of special and critical successes, and success even when significant difficulty or situational modifiers have lowered the chance of success. This represents superlative levels of expertise, the best in the world. Skill ratings over 100% can make determining opposed rolls much easier (see Opposed Skill Rolls Systems), and are especially significant in combat (see Attack and Parry Skills Over 100%).

Fate Points

Sometimes, you and your gamemaster are not willing to let the results of a roll be the ultimate arbiter of your character’s destiny. If your gamemaster wishes to allow more player agency in outcomes, power points can be used as a resource to affect the results of rolls and the narrative itself. This allows greater control of die results, and increased effectiveness in play.

Following are some suggested uses of power points to manipulate rolls or narrative:

• Spend 5 power points to re-roll any percentile roll desired. This can be declared after the initial roll is made, though the results of the second roll are final. Success with this re-roll does not earn an experience check.
• Spend 5 power points to ignore a skill and trust fate, using a Difficult Luck roll instead. This cannot be used for resistance or characteristic rolls and cannot be re-rolled. Success with this method does not earn an experience check or modify POW in any way.
• Spend 3 power points to ignore 1 point of damage from a single attack. These damage points are simply ignored; they do not count towards knockback or other effects. Your gamemaster may ask you to provide an explanation about how the damage was not suffered, such as ‘The steel whiskey flask in my front pocket caught the bullet’ or some other reason.

Any use of power points for these is handled normally, so if reduced to 0 power points, your character is exhausted and faints until regaining at least 1 power point.

The uses for power points can be expanded as your gamemaster wishes, with some of the following as possibilities:

• Spend 6 power points to shift the result a roll toward a more beneficial result, such as turning a fumble into a failure, a failure into a normal success, a normal success into a special success, or a special success into a critical success. This can only be used on your character’s rolls and cannot be applied to dice that have been re-rolled. You can do this after the dice are rolled and can shift the result by as many result levels as you want to spend power points. No matter what the initial roll was, success does not earn an experience check.
• Spend power points equal to the entire damage range of your weapon to inflict maximum damage in a single successful strike. For example, a short sword does 1D6+1 damage normally, so by spending 7 power points, it does 7 points of damage (no roll required), plus the damage modifier if applicable. This costs the entire rollable damage range of the weapon and cannot be incremented. The damage modifier is rolled normally.
• Spend a variable number of power points to add a detail to the surroundings, or to your character’s background or resources. This can range from 1 single power point for a tiny detail to 10+ power points for a significant advantage. For example, “remembering” to have brought a book of matches when matches would be useful might only cost 1 power point. However, after being disarmed and thrown in a pit, finding a rusty but usable dagger in the pile of the bones of former victims might cost power points equal to the dagger’s damage total (5 points). These costs are at your gamemaster’s discretion. Other examples might be having a contact that owes your character a favor (1–3 power points, depending on the size of the favor), being able to find clean clothing unattended hanging on a line (1 power point), or even finding the keys of a car hidden over the sun visor when needing an escape vehicle in a hurry (6 power points).

Your gamemaster should only use these options if the goal is a more action-oriented, high-adventure game with more durable and competent characters, such as superheroes or high fantasy adventurers. A horror setting should not utilize this system, as a key component of horror is the inability to control one’s fate, and a means of manipulating outcomes is counterproductive to that end.

Time Scales

Time in the game setting is rarely equivalent to time actually spent playing. Sometimes, your gamemaster may need to summarize the events of many days in a single sentence, such as “It takes you a week to reach Constantinople” while at other times, particularly in combat, a few seconds of time can take several minutes or longer to resolve.

In general, the primary scales of time are narrative time, a scene, the turn, and a combat round. The Significant Time Intervals Table lists common things that can happen in play, with how long each takes.

Narrative Time (variable)

Due to its flexibility this is the most nebulous of the time scales. It is the time your gamemaster may be narrating or when you and the other players are out-of-character discussing plans and the situation your characters are in. Most game play occurs in narrative scale. Unless there is a specific reason for it, most actual roleplaying takes place in the narrative time scale as well. When you and your gamemaster are roleplaying conversations, the narrative time scale most closely resembles real time, where a conversation takes as long to have as it takes to play.

If a game session includes lengthy travel, or periods of activity where exact time is not relevant, time is compressed greatly, generally unobserved outside of narration, and days or even weeks can be skipped over in a line of narration. If large amounts of time are being dealt with in this fashion, your gamemaster should allow your characters to perform any activities that could fit into this timeframe, within reason. If your characters are free to act during these jumps in time, your gamemaster should ask you to account for your character’s activities in that period.

Scene (variable)

This term describes any sequence that takes place in a specific location and time frame. A scene is an encounter or an instance of story time, where the players begin and end an activity. Scenes can be long or quite short, depending on what and how much happens. Essentially, a scene begins when it is important to pay attention to combat or roleplaying (leaving narrative time) and the scene ends when the characters re-enter narrative time.

Part of or an entire scene can be measured in narrative time, game turns, and combat rounds (described below), or any combination of one or more of the three. Most scenes contain narrative time, while some do not necessarily need to contain game turns or combat rounds. Some scenes, however, might be nothing but combat rounds and/or game turns.

Turn (5 minutes)

The first specific non-variable amount of time is the turn. Each turn equals five minutes (25 combat rounds). Turns are used for general movement when there is no conflict or other event that must be handled in detail. It is also a general amount of time for how long certain skills take to perform, particularly non-combat ones, such as a quick repair or properly cleaning and bandaging a wound. Chapter 3: Skills discusses how long skill attempts take to complete, though this can vary dramatically by circumstances.

Combat Round (12 seconds)

The combat round defines what happens moment-by-moment in an action sequence (not just combat). It consists of 12 seconds of fast-paced activity. When it’s important to keep track of what happens in what order, use combat rounds. These are repeated until the combat or action sequence is over and there is no more need for such detailed consideration of time.

Usually, each character gets one active (offensive) action and one or more defensive actions in a combat round. If your character does not engage in combat, in one combat round they can move about 30 meters and still be able to watch what is going on nearby, parry incoming blows, and react to emergencies.

See Chapter 6: Combat for more detail on what is possible in combat, and Combat Round Movement for more information about how fast characters can move in a combat round. Other creatures move faster or slower during a combat round (see Chapter 11: Creatures).

Significant Time Intervals Table

Following are useful examples of significant measures of time for things that happen in games:

Activity	Amount of Time
Narrative time	Variable, time spent roleplaying or describing actions
Scene	Variable, can include narrative time, turns, and combat rounds
Game turn (or just ‘turn’)	Five minutes, or 25 combat rounds
Combat round	Twelve seconds
Travel time	Characters can usually travel ten hours of time without significant difficulty, depending on mode of travel, terrain, weather, etc.
Turn	See Game turn, above
Unconsciousness	Usually around one hour, depending on cause
Regenerate 1 fatigue point	One minute (five combat rounds) of inactivity
Regenerate all fatigue points	Twenty minutes of rest and inactivity
Regenerate 1D3 hit points	One game week (seven days)
Regenerate 1 power point	One power point per hour of sleep, and 1 per two hours awake
Regenerate all power points	One game day (24 hours, or an equivalent)
Training roll, combat skills	Approximately three game weeks
Training roll, non-combat skills	Approximately 12 game weeks or less
Experience rolls	One game week or more

Time and Movement

It is often important to know precisely how far your character can travel in a game month, a week, a day, an hour, a turn, and most importantly, a combat round. Movement is classified into three categories: combat round movement, local movement, and regional movement.

• Combat round movement is relatively concrete. It is simply the amount of time your character can move in 12 seconds of game time. Combat round movement rates are described in Combat Round Movement and are based on the MOV characteristic.
• Local movement is how long it takes for your character to move from one location to another and is described in the Movement Rates Table. This is when you need to know how long it takes to get from one part of a large building to another; or across town.
• Regional movement takes you from one region to another and is usually abstract and handled through narration rather than actual gameplay. Generally, any amount of movement requiring more than an hour is best handled in regional movement. Sometimes it’s important to determine exactly how much time regional movement takes: consult the ‘Days’ column on the Movement Rates Table.

The Movement Rates Table includes common modes of travel. For reference again, a combat round is 12 seconds; a turn is five minutes; an hour is 12 turns; and a game day is assumed to allow ten hours of travel. Character actions such as riding hard and taking few rests can affect this, so your gamemaster should base other durations on these guidelines.

For more detail, see Vehicles in Chapter 8: Equipment. These rates are extremely general—for specific speeds consult the relevant entry, and your gamemaster should adjust for all of the variables like combat, repairs, terrain, traffic, etc.

Combat Round Movement

Characters have a movement rate (MOV) of 10 units per combat round. A unit can represent several to 10 meters, depending on the situation. If your gamemaster needs an exact measurement, they might use 3 meters per unit, but the relative distance between combatants is usually the most relevant matter.

Ten units represent the maximum sustainable rate of movement for a normal human being. Other creatures have different MOV rates (see Chapter 11: Creatures). When distance and rate are important, your gamemaster can provide a specific measurement, but should try to answer such questions in game terms, such as “It takes you two combat rounds to get there.”

Your gamemaster can also temporarily lower your characters’ MOV attribute based on circumstances, such as being overburdened, fatigued, cautious movement, etc. Terrain and Weather Modifiers gives guidelines about how movement can be affected by these factors. See Chases when it comes to pursuit.

The values in Movement Rates and following are approximate, based on a ten-hour travel day where relevant. Vehicles with crews working in shifts or manned by beings that do not get tired or take breaks can travel 24 hours uninterrupted.

To get a movement rate for a mode of transport not listed, determine the movement rate for that mode for a combat round. Once you have that value, it can be used to determine the rest of the movement rates:

• Multiply a combat round movement rate by ×25 for a turn
• Multiply a turn movement rate by ×12 for an hour
• Multiply an hourly movement rate by ×10 for a day
• Multiply an hourly movement rate by ×24 for an uninterrupted day of travel

Movement Rates Table

Rate	Combat Round	Turn	Hour	Day
Walking	10 meters	250 meters	3 kilometers	30 kilometers
Marching, forced*	12 meters	300 meters	3.6 kilometers	36 kilometers
Running, normally**	30 meters	750 meters	9 kilometers	90 kilometers
Running, sprinting**	50 meters	1,250 meters	15 kilometers	150 kilometers
Swimming	5 meters	125 meters	1.5 kilometers	15 kilometers
Riding, walking speed	12 meters	300 meters	3.6 kilometers	36 kilometers
Riding, gallop*	60 meters	1.5 kilometers	18 kilometers	180 kilometers
Land vehicle, drawn	10 meters	250 meters	3 kilometers	30 kilometers
Land vehicle, vintage	200 meters	5 kilometers	60 kilometers	600 kilometers
Land vehicle, modern	400 meters	10 kilometers	120 kilometers	1,200 kilometers
Land vehicle, future	1.2 kilometers	30 kilometers	360 kilometers	3,600 kilometers
Boat, small rowed	40 meters	1 kilometer	12 kilometers	120 kilometers
Ship, ancient rowed	10 meters	250 meters	3 kilometers	30 kilometers
Ship, vintage sailing	20 meters	500 meters	6 kilometers	60 kilometers
Ship, modern cruise	200 meters	5 kilometers	60 kilometers	600 kilometers
Ship, future	600 meters	15 kilometers	180 kilometers	1,800 kilometers
Train, steam engine	200 meters	5 kilometers	60 kilometers	600 kilometers
Train, bullet	1.1 kilometers	27.5 kilometers	330 kilometers	3,300 kilometers
Train, mag-lev	1.6 kilometers	40 kilometers	480 kilometers	4,800 kilometers
Air vehicle, dirigible	400 meters	10 kilometers	120 kilometers	1,200 kilometers
Air vehicle, propeller	600 meters	15 kilometers	180 kilometers	1,800 kilometers
Air vehicle, jet	3.25 kilometers	81.25 kilometers	975 kilometers	9,750 kilometers
Air vehicle, future	1.75 kilometers	43.75 kilometers	525 kilometers	5,250 kilometers
Space vehicle, modern	100 kilometers	2,500 kilometers	30,000 kilometers	300,000 kilometers
Space vehicle, future	Varies	Varies	Varies	Varies

*Optional Rule – Fatigue Points: This costs 1 fatigue point per game hour, and requires a daily Stamina roll or your character loses 1 hit point daily. If your character is mounted, both mount and rider lose the hit point. See Fatigue Points.

**Optional Rule – Fatigue Points: Running costs 1 fatigue point per turn, and requires a successful hourly Stamina roll or your character loses 1 hit point each hour. See Fatigue Points.

Terrain and Weather Modifiers

The above travel rates assume reasonable road or trail conditions. The following modifiers apply to unusual or differing types of terrain. Powered vehicles may be exempt from some of these modifiers, with common sense and your gamemaster providing the final judgment. Normal rainfall does not slow cars dramatically, while thick snow does.

• Unless bridged or fordable, a major river takes an entire day to cross. A minor river reduces movement by a negligible amount to 1/3.
• Unless on roads or trails, crossing through a forest reduces land travel rates by 1/3.
• For rolling hills, reduce movement rate by 1/3.
• For deserts, reduce by 1/3.
• For heavy storms, reduce by 1/2 to 4/5, depending on the severity of the storm. Air vehicles are only reduced by 1/5 their normal speed, though many fly above storms, and are unaffected.
• For mountains, reduce by 2/3.
• For marshes and swamps, reduce movement by 2/3.
• For ice and snow, reduce movement by 4/5, but sleighs or skis might reduce it to only 1/3.
• Heavy fog reduces the movement of most human-guided vehicles to 2/3 but does not affect walking or riding speeds.
• Travel on a river is 1/2 the speed of open water.
• At night, a ship’s speed is 1/4 the daytime speed.

These modifiers accumulate but are applied separately in order of severity rather than added together. When the reductions differ, such as 2/3 and 1/3, modify the movement rate with the more severe movement penalty first, then the second and subsequent penalties. They should never be added together, as this will potentially eliminate the movement rate altogether.

For example, riding horseback through forested mountains reduces your character to 2/3 normal movement rate for mountains. Thus, 36 kilometers of normal horseback movement rate is reduced 12 kilometers per day. This total is then reduced again by another 1/3 for the forest terrain, ending up at around 8 kilometers per day of travel.

Encumbrance

Encumbrance measures how much weight your character can carry. If your character is unencumbered, they can move faster and lose fatigue points more slowly. If your character is encumbered, they are slowed and lose fatigue points faster. Encumbrance is measured in encumbrance points (ENC). Your character can only easily carry as many points of ENC as they have points in STR and can only maneuver normally for any length of time carrying ENC equal to or less than their average of STR+CON (round up). Some creatures have different ENC limits: beasts of burden might have twice the human capacity, for example.

ENC

Any item which can be held easily in one hand (a sword, an axe, a pistol, a shield, a hand-sized rock, a rope, etc.) is a ‘thing’, an abstract unit of bulk and convenience, represented in ENC values. Most ‘things’ are 1 or 2 ENC. Though they may have very different weights, they take up the same amount of space on your character and are about the same difficulty to handle. Every item has an ENC value, measured by how difficult it is to handle rather than by its actual weight.

If an item does not have an ENC value, use its SIZ as a base and adjust by relative density or bulkiness. Chapter 8: Equipment lists the ENC of all weapons, armor, and shields, and provides SIZ values for many other common objects.

How Much is an ENC?

ENC is not a direct unit of weight. Your character can reasonably carry ENC equal to the average of their STR+CON without too much strain. While they could probably lift much more than this, ENC really measures how much they can do with the weight lifted, such as being able to carry it for a while and still function normally. Your character cannot carry an amount of ENC equal to their STR for very long and still be able to fight, climb, or run.

Your gamemaster may decide that some items have a higher ENC value than their weight indicates. This represents awkwardness in handling the item, such as additional SIZ or bulk.

ENC Penalties

Every point of ENC your character carries over their maximum ENC causes them to suffer the following modifiers:

• –1 to Movement (MOV)
• –5% to the Agility characteristic roll
• –5% to all Agility, Manipulation, Stealth, Dodge, and weapon skills

Additionally, your character loses 1 fatigue point per turn per additional ENC above their maximum while exerting themselves (marching, combat, strenuous activity, etc.) in addition to any other fatigue point losses (see Fatigue).

Character Improvement

Your character’s skills and characteristics can and should improve in play, especially when participating in adventures that take more than a day to resolve. These can be raised through training and research, but the primary means of improvement is through successfully using the skills in hazardous situations.

Skill Improvement

Successful use of a skill indicates that your character might be able to improve their rating in that skill. Note that the term ‘skill’ is used here but refers to anything rated like a skill other than a characteristic roll. Thus, this method also works for magic spells, passions, and even personality traits.

Whenever your character successfully uses a skill in a dramatic situation such as combat or when something is at stake, place a checkmark in the small box next to that skill on your character sheet. This checkmark is called an experience check. If a skill roll was Easy, no experience check is allowed. If there is no box next to the skill percentile, then the skill cannot be increased through normal experience. (For skills that cannot be increased through experience, black out the checkbox on the character sheet.)

An experience check for a particular skill is made only once per adventure, no matter how many times the skill is successfully used. Skills used before or after the ‘adventuring’ time are not eligible for experience checks, nor are skills used to augment another if the primary skill roll fails.

If a skill is used successfully, you almost always get an experience check. Something that later undoes the results does not remove an experience check. Your gamemaster should almost always allow experience checks whenever skills are successfully used in stressful situations. An attack against a helpless target is not a stressful situation and does not deserve an experience check. Likewise, taking an hour to pick a lock in your workshop is not a stressful situation—but doing the same task in one combat round, as guards approach, is a stressful situation, and deserves a check.

In addition to earning experience checks through successful rolls, your gamemaster may tell you that your character automatically earned a check in the experience box, usually through significant exposure to the skill being used successfully.

For example, this might be due to being immersed in a foreign language environment for a prolonged period and ‘soaking up’ some of the basics, or assisting an expert in that skill, paying close attention to what they say and do.

What Does “After an Adventure” Mean?

Your gamemaster determines when experience checks are made; this is usually after an adventure or significant pause between events, when your characters have had some downtime. If in doubt, assume it’s a week. During a long evening’s play the characters may earn several moments where they can see if their skills improve.

In this downtime, you may make an experience roll for each experience check on your character sheet.

Making an Experience Roll

The experience roll is a normal percentile roll. Your character’s experience bonus (equal to 1/2 INT, rounded up) is added to the die roll when determining whether the experience roll succeeded. If the result of an experience roll is higher than your character’s current skill rating, then the experience roll succeeds.

The experience bonus is not added to the actual skill points gained, just to the roll to see if there is improvement.

Increasing Skills by Experience

After a successful experience roll add +1D6 to the skill rating. The result of experience varies—your character may learn much from one incident and little from another, no matter how successfully they performed either time. Based on the level of the campaign, your gamemaster may increase the experience roll to +1D8 for epic or even +1D10 for superhuman, which creates extremely rapid advancement.

If you do not feel lucky rolling for a skill increase, you can choose to add a default of +3 to the skill rating instead of rolling. This must be announced before rolling. If the die type for the skill increase is higher than 1D6, increase it to half the dice maximum—for 1D8 it’s +4, and for 1D10 it’s +5.

Exceeding 100% in a Skill

Your character may improve their skills beyond 100%. The effect of such an increase is mainly improving critical and special success chances, but certain skills provide special benefits for ratings over 100% (see Skill Ratings Over 100%). Only successful experience rolls can increase skills beyond 100%. If your character has 100% or higher in a skill, you must roll over 100 on D100 for your character to succeed at an experience roll, which means that the experience modifier is necessary. No matter how much over 100% the skill has risen, any roll of 100 or over earns a skill improvement.

Skill Training and Research

Though experience is often the best teacher, it is not the only way to improve skills. Instruction from masters of a skill can also increase your character’s ability with a skill or even decrease it. Your character can train to improve a skill by getting instruction in it from another character with a higher rating in the same skill. This other character can belong to another player but is usually a nonplayer character. Each skill takes a different sort of teacher and costs different amounts of time and money to learn. Training to high skill ratings can be a lengthy, costly process.

The second method is research, working alone either with a self-designed course of study, deep immersion in the background of the skill, or a rigorous, self-guided disciplined regimen of exercise and physical training to improve one’s ability in a physical skill. The gamemaster should judge whether the resources are adequate for training oneself, and in some cases may rule that a skill cannot be trained alone, such as some Perception skills.

Skill Training

First, your character should find a trainer, ideally between adventures but potentially as a part of one. Some sort of compensation should be arranged, if appropriate, in money, goods, favors, patronage, or in any other acceptable item or service. The type of teacher can range anywhere from a college professor, a wise master, to an interactive holographic tutor.

Your character must then train for hours equal to their current skill rank with the skill. An average character has 50 hours of time per week available for training, but full-time non-stop study is possible. More than double this amount is grueling, and such extended studying hours are counterproductive or have negative effects on other skills or even physical and mental health.

At the end of the training session, the teacher must attempt a Teach skill roll. If their roll is successful, your character improves the skill rating by +1D6 points. A failure equals no benefit from the instruction, and a fumble is counterproductive, with the teacher causing self-doubt and contradicting your character’s prior learnings, reducing the skill by –1D3.

Your gamemaster may use a dice type to indicate better or worse training opportunities, or even automatically grant an amount increase based on factors in the setting (skill downloads, psychic implanting, past life memories, etc.).

Mastery of a skill requires actual experience outside of the ‘classroom’. No skill can be trained above 75%, no matter how good the instructor. Any increase above this must come through successful use of the skill in challenging situations, such as found during an adventure. The gamemaster may determine that this is not true in a particular setting, such as with secret scrolls of mastery or implanted skills, but the 75% maximum is the default.

Researching

Any skill that can be increased through training can also be increased through research. Research is best described as either self-help or self-tutoring: delving into ancient tomes, scouring databases; disciplined exercise; holographic instructors; or neurological or neuromuscular implanting. In most settings, some form of research is possible for any trainable skill.

Dedicated research takes as much time as training but does not incur the same cost. You should determine any costs based on the setting and the type of training being undertaken.

Researching a Knowledge skill may require additional rolls for appropriate skills like Language, Literacy, and Research. Your character may even need to make a successful roll in the very skill to be researched, to find relevant resources or to be pointed in the right direction. Unless these skills are performed in challenging or hazardous circumstances, no experience checks are awarded for skill rolls made while researching other skills.

After the required time is spent, make an experience roll as normal. If the roll succeeds, increase the skill by 1D6–2 points, or choose to add 2 to the current skill rating. Unlike training, researching allows your character to improve more than 75% in a skill, though your gamemaster may require you to get ‘out in the field’ from time to time to alternate book learning with practical experience.

Increasing Characteristics

Skills are not the only things about your character that can improve. Your character can improve their characteristics through a variety of means: POW can increase through being tested against a higher POW, and STR, CON, DEX, and CHA can increase through training and research. INT and SIZ increase only rarely, and in most settings do not change much, though your gamemaster may allow for increases based on the campaign’s setting or actions taken during (or between) adventures.

Any increases to characteristics cause any associated attributes to increase accordingly, including characteristic rolls, damage modifier, experience bonus, hit points (and total hit points and/or hit points by location), major wounds, fatigue points, power points, etc. as appropriate. Sanity points are not increased, though the temporary sanity threshold is.

Generally, characteristics other than POW can’t improve beyond the species maximum (for humans, this is 21), but for epic or superhuman power level games, this limit is ignored.

POW Increases

When your character successfully matches their POW against an opponent with equal or greater POW in a resistance roll (when a roll is 50% or less to succeed), they can check for a POW gain just like a skill gain, putting a check in the checkbox next to POW on the character sheet.

To determine if your character’s POW improves, add their maximum possible rolled POW (18 for humans) plus their minimum rollable POW (3 for humans if the standard character creation system is used—consider each bonus of +6 as a single D6 for other character creation systems). The result is 21 for most humans (18+3=21). Subtract the amount of your character’s current POW from that total. Multiply the remainder by ×5 and try to roll that result or less on D100.

If the roll is successful, increase your character’s POW by 1D3–1. This might mean no gain at all (1–1=0), or a 2-point increase (3–1=2). Alternately, you can choose not to roll and just add +1 to your character’s POW. Like an experience check, choose before rolling.

Characteristic Increases

Your character can train their characteristics to improve them. The exact method varies by the setting—a medieval world might require your character to increase their STR by lifting heavy weights, doing manual labor, etc. while a futuristic setting may utilize muscular augmentation surgery. Increasing STR or CON through training or research is limited by the highest value of the character’s original STR, CON, or SIZ. For example, if the highest value of the three is a SIZ of 14, neither STR nor CON can be increased past that number through training.

Any attempts to train or research an increase to the DEX or CHA characteristics are limited to half again the original characteristic (round up).

For example, your character with DEX 13 can train or research their DEX up to 20 (1/2 of 13 rounds up to 7, and 13+7=20).

Characteristic Increase through Training

Your character may attempt to train their characteristics, taking an amount of time in hours based on the value of the current characteristic. The exact number is the current value for the characteristic multiplied by ×25. This sort of training is rigorous and requires dedication for the entire period: one cannot break it to go adventuring or spend more than a handful of hours a day dedicated to anything else.

At the end of the training period, roll 1D3–1 and add the result to the current value of that characteristic.

For example, if your character’s STR is 12, the total number of hours required to increase their STR is 300 hours (12×25=300). At the end of 300 hours of study, you roll 1D3–1, with a result of 1 (the roll is a 2, so 2–1= 1). Your character’s STR is now 13.

You and your gamemaster should work together to determine the exact type of training required to gain this increase. Your gamemaster may allow SIZ to be trained, representing a radical change in diet or exercise to increase or decrease mass (if not height, which is usually unable to be modified without surgery).

Aging and Inaction (Option)

As your character grows older and more experienced, their skills improve, but the tradeoff is that sometimes their characteristics may decrease, especially if they are not actively adventuring or improving themselves. When beginning play as an older character, use the guidelines in Step Three, but after play has begun, use these rules.

When your character reaches 41 years of age and each year after, roll 2D6 on the Characteristic Point Loss Table to determine how many rolls to make on the Characteristic table.

Characteristic Point Loss Table

2D6	Points Lost
2	4
3	3
4	2
5	1
6–8	—
9	1
10	2
11	3
12	4

After determining the number of points lost, roll 1D10 for each point lost on the Characteristic Table. If the second roll equals ‘—’, your character does not lose a characteristic point. Rolling twice for a characteristic is combined, so losses might be –2, –3, etc.

Characteristic

1D10	Characteristic
1–2	–1 STR
3–4	–1 CON
5–6	–1 DEX
7–8	–1 CHA
9–10	—

If a characteristic is lowered to 0, your character dies, even if the characteristic is CHA. A lowered INT represents forgetfulness or difficulty focusing. However, POW and EDU do not decrease with aging.

These rules assume human characters with roughly 80–100 year lifespans. These losses can be offset with characteristic training and self-care. If your character takes exceptional care of themselves or has access to sources of longevity (exceptional medicines, anti-aging treatments, magic potions, etc.), disregard these rules. Alien or other nonhuman creatures may experience the effects from aging and inaction differently or may have different effects other than characteristic degradation.

For every 10 years of game time since your character is created, increase their EDU characteristic by +1 to represent experience learned through general living. This modifies the Knowledge roll (EDU×5) but does not affect skill points or any skills based on EDU. If your character does not interact with the outside world in this time, EDU is not improved.