Are percentile systems making a come back?

[rust]

Originally Posted by Dredj

I sent the makers of Translight rpg an email, but got no answer

The easiest way to contact MJD, the author of Translight, should be this:

Martin’s website, such as it is, can be found at http://www.martinjdougherty.co.uk/
and he can be contacted by email at martin-j.dougherty@virgin.net.

If you used any other E-Mail address, you could try to use this one to con-
tact Martin directly.

[Dredj]

Originally Posted by rust

The easiest way to contact MJD, the author of Translight, should be this:

Martin’s website, such as it is, can be found at Martin J Dougherty - my homepage
and he can be contacted by email at martin-j.dougherty@virgin.net.

If you used any other E-Mail address, you could try to use this one to con-
tact Martin directly.

Thank you. Maybe I'll give it a try later today.

[fmitchell]

Originally Posted by AikiGhost

73% skill is so much more obvious than Stat +3 Skill +7 Situational Bonus +1 +1d20 vs target number, that you don't have to think about it. This means you can get on with roleplaying your character and involving yourself in the story.

Well, The Most Popular Role-Playing Game(TM) isn't the best example of a simple die mechanic ... or it would be, if it weren't for TMPRPG(TM)'s obsession with having modifiers for everything.

Spirit of the Century, and other Fudge-based games, are a better example: roll Fudge dice (bell curve from -4 to +4, average 0) and adjust your skill level up or down by that many steps, then compare to the difficulty number. Granted, Stunts and Aspects in SotC add to the die roll (in standard increments of +1 or +2; stunts rarely give +3), and the GM can adjust the usual difficulty number a bit based on the situation. Generally, though, there are only a few small numbers to deal with ... often just two compared to one. In that case, while most people can't rattle off the exact probability, you know higher is better, and that your die roll will usually only adjust your static numbers by +/-1 about 2/3 of the time (62.9% to be exact).

As much as I like BRP, I prefer roll-high bell-curve mechanics. Roll-high systems scale linearly with increasing power, while roll-low systems have to deal with "skills over 100%" sooner or later. Bell curves occur so often in nature that it's easy to justify their use in a game, plus they reduce the influence of luck in skill tests (e.g. an 18 or 3 is much less rare on 3d6 than a 1 or 20 on 1d20 ... never mind the "Linear D6" system in Grimm which is actually two exponentially decreasing curves).

[AikiGhost]

Originally Posted by fmitchell

As much as I like BRP, I prefer roll-high bell-curve mechanics.

Thats the mathematician in you talking rather than the roleplayer!

As a GM i almost always like the simplest solution that gives vaguely in genre results. For semi realistic/dark genres thats always been BRP for me.