User:Bill/Malifaux Roleplaying

Introduction

On this page, I will compile my notes on the conversion of Malifaux to a roleplaying game. Malifaux and all affiliated properties are copyright Wyrd Miniatures. No challenge to Wyrd's rights is intended.

Malifaux is a skirmish wargame produced by Wyrd Miniatures that features a unique blend of steam punk, gothic horror, spaghetti western, and Hong Kong action movie. The genre bending nature of the game lends it an air of anything being possible, making it especially attractive for a roleplaying game.

Malifaux also utilizes a seductively fun and simple card based resolution system. One that will be easy to adapt for more variable use in the roleplaying environment. It is my opinion that most of any RPG's page count is made up of the combat system and that skirmish based wargames, with their emphasis on individual model performance, fill that role well.

The Core Mechanic

Malifaux uses a simple mechanic of adding a model's relavent stat to the face value of a card drawn from a 54 card deck of playing cards, comparing the total to a target number or contesting another player's total.

The drawing of a card is referred to as a "flip". A flip may be modified in a few ways. A flip may have a finite bonus or penalty applied to its stats or a specific action. The flip may also be modified by a positive or negative "twist of fate". In both cases one to three more cards will be flipped in addition to the normal card; in the case of a positive twist the player may choose to use any one of the cards, but in the case of a negative twist the player must use the lowest value shown.

Both of these elements are common to dice-based resolution systems. Where Malifaux deviates and really makes the cards work is that every player also has a hand of cards that he or she may substitute for any flip that is not desirable; an action referred to as "cheating fate". The exception being that a player may not cheat fate on a flip that has a negative twist.

The final element of the resolution mechanic is the use of Soulstone. In the setting, Soulstone is a precious arcane resource that enables powerful sorcerers to enhance their mystical abilities even further. In actual play any model with the Use Soulstone ability may spend them like a D20 action point to enhance a positive or neutral flip or accomplish other feats. When enhancing the flip, a Soulstone is used and an additional card is flipped. However, instead of replacing the previous card, this card's face value is added to the total. Only one Soulstone per resolution may be used in this fashion.

Combined, these elements make the resolution of actions in the wargame fast paced and exciting; both highly desirable traits in an RPG. As far as I can tell, the core mechanic should require very little modification for use outside of combat and the wargame's rules seem like they will serve well to manage most combat situations.

Stats

The wargame's stats are adequate to manage combat, including morale and mental attacks. While it will limit nuance somewhat, I do not intend to substantially modify these statistics for two reasons. First, I prefer a higher degree of abstraction. I think it emphasizes imaginative roleplay and makes character generation faster. Second, it enables the players to quickly and easily translate their characters for use in the wargame. While the second is not one of my primary goals, and I expect there to be no simple way to calculate a soulstone cost or effective cache, I think it a desirable goal.

The game defines characters with seven stats:

Wk/Chg Walk/Charge is a character's movement stat. For normal-sized characters, this defaults to 4/6; measured in inches for the wargame. Each inch works out to approximately three feet and a character may move up to its walk for one action point and charge for two. Charging provides a bonus to damage if the character is able to make a melée attack at the end of its move.

Ht Height defines a character's size and is mostly important for determining line of sight and cover in the wargame. As this is mostly cosmetic for an RPG it will default to two for adult humans. Player characters may be as small as size one, but seldom larger than two. Characters with a height of three or greater will have an extended melée range and may have enhanced combat abilities.

Wp Willpower measures a character's ability to resist mental influence and withstand morale checks. For purposes of this RPG it will do about the same thing. There is no default value for this stat, but five is typical.

Ca Casting is used in the wargame to cast spells and nothing more. For purposes of this RPG, Casting will represent a character's intellect and be used to resolve both mental tasks and social ones. Noncombative Talents will be used to enhance characters' abilities in any specific area, rather than replacing this stat with extra ones. Most characters have a Ca of 4.

Df Defense is a character's ability to evade melée and ranged attacks. Characters that are better at evading a subclass of attacks represent this through Talents. For purposes of this RPG, Df will represent a character's base agility, which will mostly be used to resolve physical actions. Df is typically 5, but can vary dramatically depending on a character's size and competence.

Wd Wounds measures a character's capacity to absorb damage. The stat needs no modification for use in this RPG. Wd is highly variable. Six or seven is fairly typical for normal sized humans, with as many as twelve for Master grade characters. I am considering Wd to be a composite value derived from a character's physical durability and the mystical forces fortifying its body. This means that despite their physical frailty characters that are more in tune with the magic of Malifaux are more durable. Talents like Hard to Wound, Hard to Kill, and Regeneration can further modify a character's ability to resist damage.

Cb Combat is a highly variable stat in the wargame associated with each melée and ranged attack that a character has at its disposal. This is a little problematic for purposes of an RPG. The only indication of what the base value of a character's Cb stat should be is the default Bash attack that any character may use, Cb3. With few exceptions, all characters in the wargame include some sort of alternate melée attack with a much greater Cb value. To address this, I'll make my first significant deviation from the wargame. Instead of defaulting all characters to Cb3, I will use a character's Df as the base value for its Cb, then modify that value with bonuses and penalties from the weapon and Talents. This necessitates the addition of Talents to the game like (Weapon) Training and Bare Knuckle Brawler; which would be consolidated into an attack profile when using the character in the wargame.