Ghostlight Mechanics

Ghostlight will introduce a new system dubbed The Suspicion Engine, which I'll examine more in upcoming posts. Here's a quick rundown of its mechanics.

You have the freedom to select your preferred random number generator—be it six-sided dice, playing cards, d10s—so long as all players opt for the same. Character traits range from 1 to 5, while action difficulty follows suit.

When taking an action, roll (or draw) a number of dice (or cards) equal to your trait rating. For instance, with a rating of 3 and using 12-sided dice, roll 3d12 and sum up the results. Meanwhile, the gamemaster rolls dice (or draws cards) equal to the difficulty level, so for difficulty 4 in this example they’d roll 4d12.

Success hinges on whether your total surpasses the difficulty. A higher total means success, while a lower total results in failure. The aftermath is narratively driven, reflecting your intended outcome—be it gaining an advantage or complicating matters for others.

The duration of outcomes or complications aligns with the rating of the trait utilized: 1 for a turn, 2 for a scene, 3 for a session, 4 for an adventure, and 5 for permanent effects.

Drama points add an extra layer of strategy. Spend one to boost an action with an additional die or card, or to exploit someone's complication, granting them a point while deducting a die or card from their pool.

There’s a no, but mechanic. In the event of failure, but with multiples (like 2 or 3 of a kind), unintended consequences arise. Think tripping and injuring yourself or experiencing a weapon malfunction. The duration matches the multiples, so 2 of a kind is duration 2, a scene. You can also add the duration to an existing complication, making it worse.

There’s also a yes, and mechanic. Successful actions with multiples yield unintended benefits, such as gaining extra information or knocking over the enemy you just struck. These effects can also exacerbate existing problems, prolonging their duration. If unsure of what to do with an additional effect, you can opt to gain a drama point as an alternative.

That’s it. Nothing groundbreaking, a remix of things that have been done before, but it serves its intended purpose and meets my design principles.