Tales from the Loop: A Dice System Analysis

Twisting and manipulating odds are what RPGs are all about. Sure, there are characters, stories, and memorable events at the table, but where the game really kicks in is through whatever random device the players use to generate the unexpected. A good game system uses interesting chances to produce fun.

Some of us analyze these systems with tools like anydice.com, plotting data and generating graphs so that we can see the science behind our enjoyment. After listening to a lets-play podcast of the Tales from the Loop rpg, my initial impression that the game is hard. In the game, players roll a number of d6s based on their skills, and are looking for at least one six to get a success. From what I've gathered, players have an average roll of about 3 dice, and they are failing more often than not.

By looking at this system's anydice, we can see that as soon as the characters start hitting 5 or more dice they start to tip the odds. Whether the players are just low level right now or if the game is just skewed towards failure on purpose, it's good to know that we can pop the numbers up a bit to get us to a nice average curve. There's a few mechanisms like "luck" re-rolls and "help a friend" boosts that swing the chances in our favor. Not bad.

Now, in order for extra, interesting, or unexpected things to happen, players need to roll two sixes or more! At face value, this seems crazy, and in practice it certainly doesn't seem to come up that often. But once again we can look at the anydice graphs for this, and surprisingly the chances for these extra effects are actually quit fair. They come up more with increased player skill, and even at 4 dice come up more often than the standard D&D 1 or 20. Cool!

I have two nit picks for the system, both of which can be ignored for the type of game it is, but not when we're doing a full analysis. First, there doesn't seem to be any way to succeed with consequences (unless thee group is in an extended test, but that's not often either). Second, there's no way for the GM to "increase the difficulty" of a task. But, for a fast, light system, it still does well to generate enough interesting outcomes.

With me getting all excited about dice systems again, I was inspired to create a new one, mixing a little of Tales from the Loop with The Great Ork Gods. I've dubbed it Skulls & Crossbones! Take a look at the anydice and see if you can guess what madness I have planned :D

Cheers!