Tricube Tales: A "One Sheet" RPG System

A couple of months ago I posted a link to a minimalist RPG I was working on called "Tricube Tales". After playtesting and incorporating feedback (with special thanks to Eli Kurtz and his players), I've tightened up the rules and hereby present the revised system, with a simple "One Sheet" layout (two pages, designed to be printed on both sides of a single sheet of paper).

Download here: Tricube Tales

Like my earlier Blood & Bile system, Tricube Tales has player-facing mechanics, with the players rolling 1-3d6 against a variable target number. However, it doesn't use color-coded dice (one of the main entry barriers for Blood & Bile). Instead, the number of dice is based on the character's Archetype, which consists of a trait (agile, brawny or crafty) and concept (warrior, pilot, investigator, etc).

The "Dark Gifts" and "Assets" from Blood & Bile have been converted into a generic "Perks" concept, while the "Curses" have been merged with the Karma-fueled "Flaws" concept from Swift d12, and are called "Quirks". Instead of a dice-pool to represent health (which was a great fit for the Blood & Bile vampire theme, but not so good for other settings), Tricube Tales uses a Resolve/Affliction system loosely inspired by Blade in the Dark.

Overall I'm pretty pleased with the final product, but I do feel it could use better examples. The mechanics are nice and simple (and fairly easy for the players to understand), but the capabilities and limitations of Perks often come down to personal interpretation and GM discretion. This is fairly intuitive for people who are used to systems like Fate or Risus (both of which provided some of my inspiration) but may prove problematic for others. I feel the system could easily be turned into a small book, with expanded guidelines and lots of examples. But that's a project for another day ;)

Example Characters

I'm a big fan of the plug-and-play adventures by Just Insert Imagination, and I think they'd be an excellent fit for a very light system like Tricube. So (with their permission), here are some quick character conversions for Fuhgeddaboudit! and Punted in the Bonce, showing how to retain the flavor of interesting characters despite the simplicity of Tricube Tales.

Fuhgeddaboudit

Michael “the bull” Savini

Archetype: Brawny Thug

Perks: Iron Will, Fruschetti Mobster, Scary

Quirks: Big Mouth, Clueless, Dyslexic

Gear: Revolver, Machete, $50

Jimmy Cobetto

Archetype: Agile Cugine

Perks: Acrobat, Thief, Fruschetti Mobster

Quirks: Green, Overconfident, Stubborn

Gear: Revolver, Switchblade, $240

Jovanni “Big joe” Bartolone

Archetype: Brawny Bruiser

Perks: Boxer, Strong as an Ox, Fruschetti Mobster

Quirks: Clumsy, Mean, Overweight

Gear: Revolver, Sawed-Off Shotgun, $100

Luciano “Puppy” Rizzi

Archetype: Crafty Conman

Perks: Gift of the Gab, Nose for Trouble, Fruschetti Mobster

Quirks: Cowardly, Compulsive Gambler, Vengeful

Gear: Brass Knuckles, Ruger, Tommy Gun, $30

Paulie “Pops” De Luca

Archetype: Agile Old-Timer

Perks: Ace Driver, Street-Smart, Fruschetti Mobster

Quirks: Anemic, Elderly, Delusional

Gear: Baseball Bat, Revolver, $250

Punted in the Bonce

Shifty Geoff

Archetype: Crafty Lout

Perks: Alert, Really Sneaky, Largument Expert

Quirks: Greedy, Extremely Annoying, No Sense of Loyalty

Gear: Replica Pistol, Swiss Army Knife, Photo of Daughter

Massive Steve

Archetype: Crafty Salesman

Perks: Ace Driver, Gift of the Gab, Intimidating

Quirks: Arrogant, Snob, Chain Smoker

Gear: Replica Shotgun, Cricket Bat, £500, 5 Cigars, Lighter

Becca

Archetype: Crafty Housewife

Perks: Hotty, Keeps Herself Fit, Manipulative

Quirks: Attention Seeker, Holds a Grudge, Spiteful

Gear: Replica Pistol, Handbag, £200, Chewing-Gum

Torpedo

Archetype: Brawny Boozer

Perks: Fast on his Feet, Ex-Navy Officer, Veteran Blagger

Quirks: Loves to Armwrestle, Overconfident, Stubborn

Gear: Real Pistol with 3 bullets

Cowboy

Archetype: Agile Psycho

Perks: Gift for Violence, Natural Brawler, Scary as Heck

Quirks: Vicious, Obsessed with America, Dog Lover

Gear: Switchblade, Can of Cola, Replica Revolver

Late to the party, but I didn't Fuhgeddaboudit!

Just Insert Imagination first entered the Savage Worlds scene with their post apocalyptic Winter Eternal setting, which I backed on Indiegogo, But since then they've been expanding their portfolio with a range of other products, one of which is a mob and road movie sandbox adventure called "Fuhgeddaboudit!", by Eric Lamoureux and Morné Schaap.

However Fuhgeddaboudit! is much more than just an adventure, it's really a mini setting in its own right, and as this is a subject I'm particularly interested in, I decided to take a look at how they've organized their product.

The actual adventure is four pages long, around twice the size of a One Sheet, and includes an introduction, the setting rules, background information, adventure scenes (including a custom Interlude table) and PC secrets, as well as some thematic extras (mobspeak slang, and ideas for jukebox background music), and statblocks for NPCs as well as vehicle stats. There's also a fifth page which lists the full stats for five pregenerated characters.

The download also includes character sheets for the pregenerated characters (and a blank character sheet for creating your own), cards containing character secrets that can be printed and handed out to the players, and three separate battle maps.

There are a few minor issues with the pregenerated characters (Jimmy's Parry doesn't factor in Acrobat, the characters have an additional Hindrance each and get points for it, Paulie isn't strong enough to use his melee weapon, and a couple of the characters haven't used all their advances), but this doesn't really matter for a one-shot adventure.

Overall it's a very cool product, particularly for PWYW, giving the GM everything they need to run a memorable one-shot adventure.

I think this "mini setting" concept could also be a very effective way to test the waters for other new settings, allowing publishers to gauge public interest before investing the time and effort into writing a full setting book.

You can pick up a copy here: Fuhgeddaboudit!