thedeck

Baby's first adventure game blog

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I absolutely love Into the Odd's decisiveness in combat. You're fighting? Whatever is getting attacked is taking damage. I also love its speed and simplicity. It's fantastic for getting out of combat and back to the parts you can't do in video games.

But one of the things that attracted me to Troika was that its combat was crunchier. That its initiative system is just too wild to pull out. That the weapons you choose have nuance and character. But it maintains the idea that when you roll, someone should take damage. I want to keep that intact while keeping the crunch higher than Into the Odd (which isn't saying much).

So now that we have STR DEX and WIL instead of just BASE SKILL to attack with, what impact does that have? Do all melee weapons add STR and all ranged weapons add DEX? Ranged weapons keep you from getting counterattacked and Troika has no penalty for point blank shooting (as far as I could tell RAW), so why play a STR character? Into the Odd uses STR as a backstop to HP, making it more valuable, but Troika has its own dedicated HP stat. I have a feeling if I start messing with that the Jenga tower starts to lean a bit too much.

The first clue was Troika's "#" weapon ability to ignore 1 Armor. It used on weapons that literally "pound" on the enemy: Hammer, Polearm, Maul (and both guns). Those didn't make sense to use DEX to attack, so I made them STR only. Anyone can use them, they just have to use their STR when they attack with it.

So this led me to D&D's Finesse weapons. Some weapons only use STR, some only use DEX, and some let the PC choose either.

Then I realized that I couldn't tell for sure whether the STR based weapons outclassed the DEX based weapons (for both 1 and 2-handed use) without calculating their Expected Damage.

So I built a spreadsheet!

Hacking Troika Into the Odd Weapon Table Screenshot
Spreadsheet in Google Docs

I also took the opportunity to rearrange the weapons into the categories they'd actually be competing against: 1 or 2 handed melee or ranged. I also whipped up values for:

  • Expected Damage (the average of the "normal" damage rolls 1-6)
  • Low Damage (average of 1-3)
  • High Damage (average of 4-7+)
  • Variance (difference between Low Damage and High Damage)

These gave me the framework I was looking for to build new weapons that fit Troika's existing balance.

My first pass of determining which 1-handed melee weapons should use STR, DEX or either showed that the Dagger (fka Knife) and the Sword really made sense with DEX, so I whipped up a Javelin and a Whip as two additional options. The Javelin and Dagger also appear in the 1-handed ranged table since you can chuck em.

The EV column shows that the Sword is far and away the best 1-handed melee weapon for a DEX focused PC, and I'm still ruminating on if I'm okay with that and/or how to adjust it. The Whip (and some of the 2-handers) might get a Reach mechanic, but I'm still on the fence about that too.

I liked how the 2-handed melee options are pretty much STR only, but I need to figure out a niche for the Staff. Why would a DEX character use two hands to wield a Staff when the Sword and even Whip deal more damage with one less hand? Maybe that one gets reach too? TBD.

1-handed ranged weapons only had one entry (the Pistolet), so I added a Sling and Hand Crossbow in addition to the aforementioned Dagger and Javelin. The Pistolet is obviously the best overall damage dealer, but the idea that it's very feast or famine and its ammo is competing with spellcasting seems balanced.

I was happy to see that the 2-handed ranged weapons offered a clean way to differentiate a Bow from a Longbow: The Shortbow (fka "Bow") can use STR or DEX, but the Longbow requires STR, deals more damage, and penetrates armor. I'm concerned that the Fusil might be busted but it follows the same considerations as the Pistolet above.

So, to review, my combat update goes like this:

  • Standard Troika initiative
  • Melee attacks require both characters to roll d20 + either STR or DEX + Advanced Skill
  • The winner of that roll deals damage to the loser

The only change at the table is rolling d20 instead of 2d6. I am sad to move away from Troika's small number addition to two digit addition, but I think it'll be fine. Mostly.

Quick, what's 12 + 16 + 3? Is that bigger than 14 + 9 + 5?

See? Fine. 😬

Next up: Determining starting gear based on stat rolls!



You can't really talk about replacing Troika's BASE SKILL stat without considering what that means for Advanced Skills. For as foreign a system as Troika seemed to me, seeing something that reminded me of D&D 3.5's Skill list in an OSR game was oddly anachronistic.

What I like about Advanced Skills:

  • Gives PC's individuality despite potentially sharing a BASE SKILL
  • Increase as PC's gain experience
  • Making up new ones

What I didn't like about Advanced Skills:

  • They were the only stats PC's could increase
  • They suggest to players that the answer might be on their character sheet
  • They don't let PC's cast spells untrained (see the Spells as Items post once its done)

My first thought was to split BASE SKILL into 3 stats calculated in the same way:

  • d3+3 for STR
  • d3+3 for DEX
  • d3+3 for WIL

But then I looked at how often two PC's stats ended up being the same as each other and realized that I wanted some more variance among scores.

But I couldn't just increase the stat range without breaking the 2d6 roll under aspect:

  • BASE SKILL ranges from 4 to 6
  • Advanced Skills range from 0 to about 4
  • So the hardest roll under a PC can attempt would be 4, and the easiest about 10.

Elegant, nice, great.

What about adjusting it down? From d3+3 to d6?

That would mean rolling a 1 or 2 in STR would make it impossible for a PC to roll under on something like climbing a wall without a relevant Advanced Skill.

Ew.

So then... What if starting STR DEX and WIL kept their 3d6 generation from Into the Odd and we moved from 2d6 roll under to d20 roll under? Is that insane?

I don't think so?

That lets us keep all the working parts of Into the Odd's stat system (roll under relevant stat for challenges, roll over to increase a stat by 1 on "level up", and stat-based starting equipment packages) and things like combat can still be Roll VS, with both sides rolling a d20 instead of 2d6.

Monster stats would adopt the same ITO approach of "all 10's unless it's notable," or just rebalance their single SKILL number with one along 3d6's curve rather than the d3+3 curve.

So do we still need Advanced Skills?

I think so, they'd just be a bit less common in starter packages. I mapped the ones from the base rules against what Stat I think each would be rolled with:
Uses STR

  • Climb
  • Ride
  • Run
  • Swim
  • Strength (Completely replaced by STR)

Uses DEX

  • Acrobatics (Probably completely replaced by DEX)
  • Fly
  • Locks
  • Sleight of Hand
  • Sneak

Uses WIL

  • Astrology
  • Awareness
  • Disguise
  • Etiquette
  • Evaluate
  • Healing
  • Languages
  • Mathmology
  • Poison
  • Second Sight
  • Secret Signs
  • Specific Spell Skills (Probably completely replaced by WIL)

GM determines / Case by case / I’m not sure

  • Craft Skills
  • Golden Barge Pilot
  • Tracking
  • Trapping
  • Tunnel Fighting
  • Weapon Fighting

All of this still begs some questions:

  • What stat do you attack with?
  • Does this affect weapons at all?
  • Can you still damage STR DEX and WIL like Into the Odd?

To be continued!



I initially ignored Troika due to its gonzo setting, bias against non-d20 systems, judging a book by its cover, whatever.

I saw the Questing Beast video reviews and the recommendations on /r/osr over the years but I just wasn't ready to see its merits.

Then I see that Troika is now 100% free and I figure why not give it another chance.

This game took some stuff I loved about Into the Odd, Knave, and Cairn (quick & flavorful character generation, slot-based inventory, risky combat) and brought its own cool ideas I'd never considered:

  • Attacking in melee can backfire
  • Rolling to retrieve items from your pack quickly
  • HP as a cost for spells
  • Rolling to cast spells (with miscasts)
  • Armor encumbrance = double its DR value
  • Skill, Stamina, and Luck

It also kinda bugged me that almost every roll used a PC's Base Skill, which is d3+3 at character creation and never changes.

So a PC with 4 Skill will always be rolling 2 worse than a PC with 6 Skill at general tasks.

And it bugged me so much, I thought I must be missing something. I reread the rules, asked around the discord, and it turns out I had it right.

The discord mentioned the idea that some GMs let players choose their Skill at character creation, with 4 being "Hard Mode" and 6 being "Easy Mode". And that's cool I guess, kinda like choosing from a set of stat arrays.

But I wanted to see what would happen if I added Into the Odd's stats into the mix.

But that wasn't the only thing I wanted to try bringing over:

  • STR, DEX, WIL
  • Starting equipment tables based on stat rolls
  • Improving stats over time
  • Equipment as character
  • Spells as items

So that's what this blog's gonna start out as. My process trying to combine Troika and Into the Odd.