OVA - The anime inspired Generic RPG
OVA RPG
Hello and welcome to the first actual post here in The Inexperienced GM, and what better way to start than with the first game I ever ran: OVA - The anime RPG.
OVA RPG (Open Versatile Anime RPG) was created by Clay Gardner after a very successful Kickstarter (this is the 2nd edition of the game), and is, as its name implies, a Generic System designed to run Anime-styled games (Mostly Shonen). The game itself is rather straightforward, but it has a few weird mechanics that require some explaining, so let's get into it:
Sounds simple, right? Well, there's a catch to it. You do roll a number of D6's equal to (2 + Levels in relevant Abilities - Levels in relevant Weaknesses) (More on this later), but the result of your roll will be equal to either the highest number you rolled OR the sum of the dice that came up with the same result. For example: Say I roll 3 dice, and the result is 2, 4, 6, then my final result is a 6. Now, if the roll would've been: 4, 4, 6, then my final result is an 8 (4+4). It takes some time to get used to it, but I promise it works great.
Aside from that, 2 other "new" mechanics come to mind:
- Drama Dice, which lets a player who failed a roll to spend 5 Endurance (More on that later) to roll a new die in hopes of getting a better result.
- Miracles, which lets a player spend 30 Endurance and automatically pass a roll (At GM's discretion)
That pretty much covers the mechanics of the game, not a lot to learn. There are additional rules like scaling powers and such, but the basics are there. Now, for the fun part:
Character Creation:
The interesting part about the character creation in OVA is that it's rather descriptive. Simply put, each character has Abilities with levels that range from 1 to 5 (1 being above average and 5 being god-tier), and Weaknesses with levels ranging from 1 to 3 (1 being a minor inconvenience and 3 being crippling weakness). As for the options for abilities and weaknesses, well...
I'll cover Perks and Flaws later, but for now, yeah, it allows a lot of customization. Now, as I've said before, character creation is descriptive. First, players choose a concept, then see which Abilities and Weaknesses are appropriate for the chosen concept. The book suggests 3 rules, from which a GM and their players should choose at least 1. These rules are meant to limit characters and not make them too powerful, since well... Time Freeze and Teleport are right there. I've found that giving each player 15 levels of Abilities and 10 of Weaknesses to choose from, and limiting the starting max level of any Ability to 3 is a good way of getting balanced characters (This depends on which kind of game you want to play). Limiting the Abilities and Weaknesses the players can choose is also something that can (And to some degree, should) be done, since you probably don't want a time-stopping, teleporting Mecha in your Medieval Fantasy story (or maybe you do, it does sound kinda awesome).
Now, when it comes to combat, that's when Perks and Flaws come into play. In OVA each player is expected to create their character's attacks (Yes, with cool names and all), and Perks and Flaws are ways to modify their attacks; make them hit harder, give them lasting effects, or make them armor piercing are some of the Perks they can choose when creating an attack. But keep in mind that as they choose Perks, the Endurance cost per attack increases. A way to decrease the cost is by picking Flaws, like making it so that the character has to concentrate for some time before being able to deliver their fatal blow (Take in consideration that characters in OVA have a base Endurance of 40, and most Perks increase an attack's cost by 5). This is one of the things that help to make OVA characters so unique, the level of customization that can go into a single character. While that is great for players, it's easy for a GM to find themselves overwhelmed by this, since you don't know what your players will create. That's why, the first thing you must do is talk things out with your players, speak about what you're expecting and what they're expecting and come to an agreement, so that, by the time the game starts, everyone is playing the characters they want to play, and they're appropriate for the GM's setting.
Now, let's take a look at a blank character sheet:
Now, let's break it down a bit:
Now, something I forgot to mention is that each character only gets KOed if both HP and END are 0. If either falls to 0, the character gets a -2 dice penalization to ALL rolls and starts decreasing the one that's left for everything (taking damage, spending END for attacks, etc.). Drama Dice and Miracles REQUIRE END, and can't be performed if the character's END is at 0.
Now, I know what you're thinking:
Well, we'll get there in the next post, since this one is getting kind of long. So please look forward to it.
For now, that was a quick overview of OVA RPG. Inexperienced GM logging out.
Next up: OVA - The anime-inspired Generic RPG - Combat rules, experiences and more
OVA RPG (Open Versatile Anime RPG) was created by Clay Gardner after a very successful Kickstarter (this is the 2nd edition of the game), and is, as its name implies, a Generic System designed to run Anime-styled games (Mostly Shonen). The game itself is rather straightforward, but it has a few weird mechanics that require some explaining, so let's get into it:
The mechanics:
First of all, we're looking at a D6 game, which uses a dice pool for its rolls. You roll a number of D6 vs a target number, or TN (which is a number that depends on the difficulty of the task you're trying to accomplish), compare the result with the TN and, if the roll is equal or higher than the TN, the task succeeds.Sounds simple, right? Well, there's a catch to it. You do roll a number of D6's equal to (2 + Levels in relevant Abilities - Levels in relevant Weaknesses) (More on this later), but the result of your roll will be equal to either the highest number you rolled OR the sum of the dice that came up with the same result. For example: Say I roll 3 dice, and the result is 2, 4, 6, then my final result is a 6. Now, if the roll would've been: 4, 4, 6, then my final result is an 8 (4+4). It takes some time to get used to it, but I promise it works great.
Aside from that, 2 other "new" mechanics come to mind:
- Drama Dice, which lets a player who failed a roll to spend 5 Endurance (More on that later) to roll a new die in hopes of getting a better result.
- Miracles, which lets a player spend 30 Endurance and automatically pass a roll (At GM's discretion)
That pretty much covers the mechanics of the game, not a lot to learn. There are additional rules like scaling powers and such, but the basics are there. Now, for the fun part:
Character Creation:
The interesting part about the character creation in OVA is that it's rather descriptive. Simply put, each character has Abilities with levels that range from 1 to 5 (1 being above average and 5 being god-tier), and Weaknesses with levels ranging from 1 to 3 (1 being a minor inconvenience and 3 being crippling weakness). As for the options for abilities and weaknesses, well...
There's a lot of them...
I'll cover Perks and Flaws later, but for now, yeah, it allows a lot of customization. Now, as I've said before, character creation is descriptive. First, players choose a concept, then see which Abilities and Weaknesses are appropriate for the chosen concept. The book suggests 3 rules, from which a GM and their players should choose at least 1. These rules are meant to limit characters and not make them too powerful, since well... Time Freeze and Teleport are right there. I've found that giving each player 15 levels of Abilities and 10 of Weaknesses to choose from, and limiting the starting max level of any Ability to 3 is a good way of getting balanced characters (This depends on which kind of game you want to play). Limiting the Abilities and Weaknesses the players can choose is also something that can (And to some degree, should) be done, since you probably don't want a time-stopping, teleporting Mecha in your Medieval Fantasy story (or maybe you do, it does sound kinda awesome).
Now, when it comes to combat, that's when Perks and Flaws come into play. In OVA each player is expected to create their character's attacks (Yes, with cool names and all), and Perks and Flaws are ways to modify their attacks; make them hit harder, give them lasting effects, or make them armor piercing are some of the Perks they can choose when creating an attack. But keep in mind that as they choose Perks, the Endurance cost per attack increases. A way to decrease the cost is by picking Flaws, like making it so that the character has to concentrate for some time before being able to deliver their fatal blow (Take in consideration that characters in OVA have a base Endurance of 40, and most Perks increase an attack's cost by 5). This is one of the things that help to make OVA characters so unique, the level of customization that can go into a single character. While that is great for players, it's easy for a GM to find themselves overwhelmed by this, since you don't know what your players will create. That's why, the first thing you must do is talk things out with your players, speak about what you're expecting and what they're expecting and come to an agreement, so that, by the time the game starts, everyone is playing the characters they want to play, and they're appropriate for the GM's setting.
Now, let's take a look at a blank character sheet:
Now, let's break it down a bit:
- Abilities and Weaknesses: This is pretty self-explanatory. Here's where the chosen Abilities and Weaknesses, and their respective levels, are written down.
- Combat Stats: Here's where the attacks are recorded. Name, Perks and Flaws, Description, The amount of D6's you roll for the attack, Damage modifier (DX, which is 1 unless modified by Perks or Flaws), and Endurance Cost.
- Defense: The amount of dice rolled when defending against an enemy attack. This is 2 + Levels in relevant Abilities (IE: Quick)- Levels in relevant Weaknesses (IE: Slow)
- HP: Well... I don't have to explain what this is, do I? It's Health Points, and each character has a base value of 40, which can be increased or decreased by choosing the right Abilities and Weaknesses
- Endurance: This represents each character's stamina, energy, Ki, Mana, or however you want to call it. It's what's used to attack, add Drama Dice, and perform miracles
Now, something I forgot to mention is that each character only gets KOed if both HP and END are 0. If either falls to 0, the character gets a -2 dice penalization to ALL rolls and starts decreasing the one that's left for everything (taking damage, spending END for attacks, etc.). Drama Dice and Miracles REQUIRE END, and can't be performed if the character's END is at 0.
Now, I know what you're thinking:
Well, we'll get there in the next post, since this one is getting kind of long. So please look forward to it.
For now, that was a quick overview of OVA RPG. Inexperienced GM logging out.
Next up: OVA - The anime-inspired Generic RPG - Combat rules, experiences and more
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