Story Engine Universal Rules

Outgrown the d20 system? Think GURPS is too clunky and bogged down? Then welcome to Story Engine, a bare bones, streamlined generic system. The systems is built around 6 sided dice, yes, just one kind of die! There are 4 stats; Matter (for physical trials) Mind (mental), Spirit (willpower) and Chaos (luck). To create a character the player spends story points to create descriptors under each stat. For4 example, you could spend some points and make your character "strong" (Matter) some more to make him "Handsome" (Matter again) and then maybe a few more to say "Things tend to go his way" (Chaos). But the descriptors aren't merely window dressing. During the game the player can "burn" a descrptior for a bonus on the trial check. The above character could say, "I'm so 'strong' I should win this battle" burning the "strong" descriptor for that gaming session and thus claim the bonus.In addition to the stats the players can develop abilities (basically skills, your level of experience with each skill determine s your bonus on checks) and special features, the nature of whcih depend on the campaign. In a hard-science espionage campagin a special abilitiy might be "Very Likeable." In a supoerheroes campaign, it might be flight or x-ray vision.There are only two things that might bring this system down in some people's eyes. First, as stated, the game is minimalist, all trials are resolved by a single die roll. For people who enjoy long, drawn out battles and still think it's cool to keep track of "hit points" this can be a problem. Second, unlike GURPS there is little to no support material, which means the GM will have to do a lot of work to set up a campaign. If you don;t mind this though, "Story Engine" provides one of the best generic gaming systems available.