DIEfiant
About
DIEfiant is an original tabletop roleplaying game designed around a unique two-phase game flow. Over the first 3.5 weeks of work, our 4 person team developed a system of stats and rolls that focuses on enhancing the feeling of playing an amateur, where anything can happen!
Gameplay Overview
In DIEfiant, players take on the role of amateur monster hunters who have to take down a disastrous threat to their home. It is a classic TTRPG where a game master (GM) develops and runs a story and players create characters (PCs).
Unique D6 System
I designed a unique system for making ability checks based around contested rolls and an “even the improbable can happen” attitude, reinforcing the amateur feel of the game.
Two-Phase Gameplay
We developed a two-phase system of gameplay, the Investigation and Engagement, to provide clear goals for play and a built-in way for keeping the story moving. These phases each have their own central gameplay and feeling.
Player Character Creation
The center of the story of DIEfiant, like many TTRPGs, are the player characters and how they interact with the story. We wanted to keep character creation simple, yet still allow it to inform player decisions in roleplay and combat.
Stats and Attitudes
In DIEfiant, players make their characters based on a simple, trope-inspired system developed for this game. It is partially inspired by Powered by the Apocalypse, where characters’ Attitudes (classes) inform the vast majority of the character creation. However many of the major decisions were reworked and redesigned to fit in with our unique stat and rolling system.
The four stats; Fight, Flight, Sense, and Snoop; are used for making checks when performing difficult actions. Each character has a base 3 in each stat, with positive or negative changes being added by their chosen Attitude.
Abilities
Along with their stats, we wanted to give each Attitude a set of abilities to make them feel more unique and open up our design space. After many iterations and testing, we settled on giving each Attitude two abilities: one more useful during the Investigation, the other during the Engagement.
Investiagion abilities tend to be more geared to roleplay, allowing players to feel more connected to their character and have a bit more guidance. Engagement abilities, on the other hand, are focused on keeping the hunt exciting. These may amplify an attack or give players an edge in trapping the monster.
Advancement
One pretty major design challenge was how to deal with player advancement in a game centered around amateurs. Keeping a balance of letting the characters grow, and keeping players feeling like they are getting stronger, without having these characters get so strong they no longer fit into the amateur basis has been one of the most workshopped parts of the game. In the end, we came up with a two-fold solution.
First off, Advancement happens at the end of a successful hunt, or a complete story. At this point the players fill in one of the four Advancement bubbles on the top right of the sheet. If all four bubbles are already filled, the characters is a bit too advanced to be called and amateur and has to be retired. If they can fill in a bubble, they then get to choose an ability from a different Attitude, representing how the character has grown and providing new options for the next hunt.
Monster Creation
As a monster-hunting game, we knew the monster had to be more than just a pre-made sheet of a basic zombie, or dragon, or robo-beast. With this in mind, I developed a system for GMs to easily create their own monsters, one specific to the story and hunt they run.
Monster Basics
The first thing to work out is what monster the GM wants to use. This can be either a general type, like dragon, or something very specific, like Loch Ness Monster. This informs their choices for the rest of the creature, either directly or indirectly.
A monster’s main stat is the stat it will use for every roll. Originally the monster had a full set of four stats, much like the player, but after testing it became clear this felt awkward. Monsters have a base of 5 for their rolls.
The Lair
The lair of a monster is always extremely important to tracking it down and taking it out. In DIEfiant, the lair is one of the major pieces of information players uncover about the monster during their Investigation. This is often the last piece, giving them the final bit of knowledge they need to take the fight to the monster.
Traits and Skills
The most in-depth, and largest design challenge, of making a monster is deciding what it can do that makes it unique. These have been split into passive effects, Traits, and extra actions, Skills. The rulebook includes a list of Traits and Skills that can be easily slotted into the monster, to give GMs who are less interested in the mechanics of this part a way to still have engaging hunts. On the development side, I based the sample features on aspects of popular monster folklore and mythology.
Discovering the monsters Traits and Skills is an important part of t the player’s Investigation as it can give an edge during the Engagement. Some monsters have Traits that make them a much more difficult combatant, and figuring out how to deal with or even disable them may mean the difference between victory and defeat. This was another big reason I had for adding a list of sample traits, to give a good base for GMs developing their own without making them unfair.