Here we are, in the Alpha Stages. Significant amounts of new content will be released over the next few weeks. Enjoy what you find. We have added the nifty little search bar. No telling what you’ll find.
Player’s Rules
Getting Ready to Play
Midnight in Vaia is a Table Top Role Playing Setting. TTRPGs at their core are group storytelling. To get started we need paper and something to write with. To play we need variable generators; Dice or a RNG app will work.
Some groups use platforms to make and play on maps. All we need is our story chops here. A grid and some figurines can do all the heavy lifting. Get as fancy as you want, but remember. It’s all for the story.
Story Guide’s Notes
Starting a New Campaign
Work with each of your Players to get them equipped with starter kits appropriate for their back story and current situation. History sets the scene for right now.
The core of the rules are simple for a reason. We want to be able to slap down our character sheets, write their name, slot our attributes, figure hit points, and start playing.
Playing the Game
We act and the world reacts. These exchanges make up the game, like in life. It is whatever you imagine, and then… Consequences.
Cinematic Execution
Outside of Active Phase we have significant freedom to do whatever we describe for our characters. Cinematic Execution is a form of Plot Armor for both the Players and the Story Guide. You may well get away with anything until the Story Guide interjects with applying an Active Phase Encounter Type, setting the stage for system mechanics to apply to interactions.
Variables
To represent the chaotic nature of our world we use variables to help determine the outcome of events. These (v:X) are modified by attributes, buffs/debuffs, situational adjustments, abilities, equipment, magic, and skills.
(v:4) (v:6) (v:8) (v:10) (v:12) (v:20) (v:100)
A specific check will show the variable range and whatever bonuses or penalties are added to it. For example (v:20 Strength) is 1-20 +/- Strength.
Resolution of Opposition
The vast majority of moments are not accounted for in the rulesets, sometimes the Story Guide and the Players just haven’t found those rules yet, the Story Guide and the Players may opt to have opposed variable check.
Opposed rolls. Such as the rogue-like player sneaking past a guard. While there may be rules for trained effects here. In this example neither is trained. A simple opposed roll between the rogue-like using his Accuracy or Agility against the Guard’s Awareness. The player rolling (v:20 Accuracy) and the Guard rolling (v:20 Awareness) the higher roll take all. (Sneak by or get Caught.)
Effect Trees
Effect Trees. They break the game. They’re supposed to. In most cases where strange conflicts come between how an Effect Tree acts and normal mechanics operate, the Story Guide must make a ruling. We suggest leaning toward the text of the Effect Tree, and likely in favor of the Player that picked it for their character. Sometimes, thinking about it together brings all new possibilities to the table.
Slipping into an Encounter
When the Story Guide decides, they may transition the group into Active Phase.
Active Phase Action System Cycle
(v:20 Awareness) & Stay Action
Initialization Actions
A/B Cycle - Full Round/Upkeep
Encounter Outro
Encounter Flow
(v:20 Awareness)
An encounter begins with an awareness check, this check determines the initiative, or order of who goes when. In cases where multiple players or non players have the same awareness, they gain their Action Slots simultaneously. Players will take their Active Phase before non players, and players who tie make opposed (v:20) checks. The winner goes first between the two, but the other can interject with Action Slots if interacting directly the other one in the Active Slot.
Stay Action:
A player with a higher Awareness roll may choose to start their Active Phase later in the Full Round, but once their place is assigned in the initiative it can't be changed.
Initialization Actions
Some effects and abilities may only be used during initialization. These are immediately applied or resolved before the player or character with the highest Awareness goes first.
Full Round: The Repeating Cycle
A Full Round is Five seconds.
The Full Round begins when the character with the highest awareness gains their Action Slots and starts their Active Phase. They may use or convert their Action Slots.
Until they have used all of their Action Slots, or converted their Action Slots into Reserve Slots and moved into their Reserved Phase, the next character does not gain their Action Slots.
When the character who goes last either uses or discards their Action Slots the Full Round ends. All Reserved Action Slots at this point are lost to Hesitation.
Upkeep
At the end of a Full Round, the Game Master and Players go through the upkeep process. During upkeep all of the following mechanics are resolved, as well as any outsider mechanics that use Upkeep to resolve.
Regeneration effects including resource recovery are applied during Upkeep.
Round countdown - Any actions, buffs, or debuffs that have a duration tick down by one or resolve.
Upkeep Damage and Healing over time effects. (Some DoTs and HoTs trigger with the use of every Action Slot or by other intervals based on their descriptions.)
Encounter Outro
Once all threats are played out, the Game Master may choose to run outro in a few different ways. One is all resolve, the other is the slow burn.
All Resolve is the easy way out. We end all combat effects immediately, leave the Active Phase, and clean the board. This is a cut the show to move things into the next scene.
Slow Burn on the other hand we will continue to go through rounds, but we will remove the Initiative Slots, Allowing players to volunteer up to their available Action Slots each round to work together to resolve an issue, and the Upkeeps keep coming. The Slow Burn is where a Combat Encounter converts into an Environmental Encounter.
Slow Burn Notes:
Stronger poisons and bleeding effects can still kill a character if left untreated. A heal over time effect can be added up to figure out how much is regenerated. Attempting to revive a downed or dead character is a good reason to go through a Slow Burn.
Taking Action
Active Phase
Once Awareness is determined and an order is made of who goes when from highest to lowest, we list everyone in Active Phase. Those who rolled the same (v:20 Awareness) go in the same Active Phase.
The last character’s Active Phase before Upkeep is called the Final Phase. All Actions taken at this point, before the last character uses or discards their Action Slots, Cost Four Times as many Action Slots to activate. (Twice as many Reserve Slots)
Slots not used are discarded due to Hesitation.
Slot availability:
Characters gain their Action Slots at the beginning of the Active Phase.
Until a player gains their Action Slots in the current round or has Reserved Slots, they cannot move or react to other's actions.
Action Slots:
All players have a base of Five Action Slots per Full Round. Attributes, Abilities, Equipment, and some special effects may modify the total number of Action Slots a character has at their disposal in a round.
Reserved Action Slots:
If a character does not use all of their Action Slots and ends their Active Phase, all remaining Action Slots become Reserve Slots. Only skills and abilities that clearly state they may be used with Reserved Slots may be executed with Reserved Action Slots. Many abilities will have different costs depending on whether they are used in Active Phase or Reserved Phase.
Non-standard action lengths:
Actions that are normally considered free for an individual or as part of another action consume one action slot if more than one character has to interact with the objective or object.
Combo actions:
Some actions, skills, and abilities require multiple characters to both have active Action Slots and Reserved Slots and be in a certain proximity to each other to be usable. In these cases, the active character spends their Action Slots in order to initiate the action, and the other character(s) spend their Reserve Slots to finish the action.
Multi-Round Actions
There are many instances where we might take multiple rounds to perform an action. In these cases, the player can not Reserve their Action Slots. They have to use their Action Slots to begin the action, and will use their gained action slots in the next Full Round in the Active Phase to complete the action. If any effect would cause them to not be able to finish the action between this round and the next, they lose the Action Slots either way.
What ever (v:X) rolls attributed to the action still take place at the initialization of the action. We play this off as the second portion of the slot drain as recovering from execution.
In some cases, Multi-Round Actions are interruptible, interruptible effects have conditions than can make them fail. Their effect is resolved at the end of spending the Action Slots to use the ability. All rolls attributed to these actions are resolved once all the Action Slots to use the ability are spent on the Full Round of their conclusion.
Examples of Action Slot Ratings
Common: 1AS|2RS|4RS
Active Phase: (1AS)
Reserved Phase: (2RS)
Final Phase: (4FP)
Exception: 3AS|3RS|4FP
Active Phase: (3AS)
Reserved Phase: (3RS)
Final Phase: (4FP)
Environmental Encounters
“The Door? What about the door? It is just a door. Open it.”
-The Last Words of Ginny Mitts
Environmental Encounters are the players vs. the walls, the maze, the cave, the cold peaks, the rotting rope bridge. The dehydrating, cooking desert. The muggy tropical, and nasty sewers. These encounters are every moment the characters are in. The setting. Old traps, slippery slopes, pits, electric fences, rockslides, tornadoes. Rain? Weather in general. The encountered setting offers truly endless possibilities. In Vaia, we have a long list of environmental possibilities, but let’s keep this short and simple for now.
The Metropolis has a few features that are common throughout the city. The sky bridges that make most of the city traversable by foot. The highly regulated substations that connect the entire inner city by speed rail. The floor wide gardens in every major building that sustain the population through artificial light and automated systems. The serpentine wall that separates the districts, and how the lines of censorship structures power.
Attributes and Effect Trees
Attributes measure our raw ability to interact with the world around us in all basic manners. Effect Trees can completely overhaul situations by creating superior options.
Object Manipulation
Strength is used when objects are heavy, jammed, or hard to move or pick up in general. We have an effortless range, at Ten pounds per the Strength Attribute, up to Fifty pounds at +5 Strength. Zero or less Strength can only effortlessly interact with objects that are Five pounds.
The Steps We Take
There are a variety of ways a character can move. Moving takes time, and therefore during Active Phase, cost Action Slots.
Movement Skills
Moving one square, approximately a meter, consumes one Action Slot.
It takes two Reserved Slots to move one meter.
It takes four Final Phase Slots to move one meter.
Climbing
An easy climb takes two Action Slots per meter. Any climb more difficult than an easy climb is a Special Encounter which may require multiple variable checks and have unexpected dangers.
Swimming
An easy swim takes two Action Slots per meter. Any swimming more difficult than an easy swim is a Special Encounter which may require multiple variable checks and have unexpected dangers.
Jumping
A character may jump instead of walking. They may spend one Action Slot to Jump one meter. This effect does not necessarily make them immune to rough terrain, or suffering effects from moving through a square, entirely at the call of the Story Guide.
Falling
Flying is fun, but have you tried falling? For each meter you fall when falling more than three meters, when you land you take (v:4+1) damage, divided by positive Agility, or multiplied by a negative Agility.
Drowning & Suffocating
If your character can’t breathe for more than Six Full Rounds they must succeed in increasing Strength Variable checks to remain conscious. At Six Full Rounds the first check is 8 and increases by 2 each Full Round until they can breath again. Once unconscious if the character remains where they can not breath for 12 Full Rounds, they die.
Social Encounters
There is power in words and simple gestures.
Death is Often a Poor Choice of Words
Sometimes in the moments that define, we sheath our sword, rest our axe, plant our staff, or hide our daggers. All in exchange for the words that save our lives, the lives of our enemies, and bring peace to our halls.
Reasonable Diplomacy
In Cinematic Execution we may have several variable checks for the tide of converse. Negotiation driven by dice rolls, well said statements, the perfect question that makes the scene run its course.
Powerful Oration
The right words may halt a battle. The right words forge alliances. The right words make the world from nothing by wonderous and charismatic leaders.
Speaking in Active Phase
Somewhere between five to ten words with no special conveyance, such as The Orator Abilities, are free to use during an Active Phase. Speaking at all up to twenty words costs one Reserve Slot in the Reserve Phase, and Two Reserve Slots in the Final Phase. A quick response, up to five words, from other characters who do not have slots, who are in reserve phase to an Active Phase character is free.
TL:DR
A few words back and forth are free on your active phase
A few words cost 1RS after your active phase
Twice as much in Final Phase
Between Lies and the Truth
A lie, a bluff, a quick spit of silver tongued rogues. Untrained, a Lie is always a turn toward suspicion. A battle of Acumen vs. Awareness. Opposed (v:20) Getting caught in a lie is a heavy consequence.
Combat Encounters
Better to be prepared, than lost.
If We Must
Not all table top is for fighting for our lives. Although, we shouldn’t be ignorant of the world around us. Every day Vaia becomes a little less stable. More and more incidents of isolated violence play out on the news and in the Feed. Well, is your character a savior, or the violent?
We should roll Awareness, and hop into Active Phase.
Full Variable Accuracy and Armor System
The Numbers
Evasion (1+Agi+Awa+Acc)
Evasion is your ability to avoid attacks. Effects that lower Evasion include direct attribute denials and various Effect Trees. If bound, you lose your agility bonus rounded down, if blind or senseless you lose half your Awareness bonus and Accuracy bonus. If bound and blind, or just unconscious, your Evasion is reduced to 1.
Accuracy Rolls that fall in the Evasion range Misses, unless there is an effect in place that triggers on a miss.
Accuracy Rolls that equal the Evasion score are a Half Hit, and hit for half of their effect. This halving includes over time effects, reducing both the duration and numerical effects by half before Damage Reduction is applied.
Accuracy, Evasion, Mitigation
In most TTRPGs we have a simple base system which is then compounded in complexity by the various character growth systems. We overlook the value of base equipment seeking out that plus one. FVAAAS has a little learning curve.
Mitigation Range (MR)
Mitigation Range is the protective covering of armor.
Accuracy rolls that fall in the Mitigation Range are an Armor Hit and apply damage up to the Resistance Rating of the Armor to the Armor’s Durability pool before Damage Reduction is resolved, and then damage is applied to the Hit Point pool.
Direct Hit
A Direct Hit is any Accuracy Roll that Exceeds the Solid Hit range.
(Accuracy - Full Mitigation = Direct Hit Bonus Damage)
Accuracy rolls that exceed the Full Mitigation Range deal bonus damage equal to excess hit value. In our example with the Full Mitigation at 18 a roll of 19 would deal +1 Damage, a roll of 26 would deal +7 damage.
Solid Hit
The three point range that exceeds the Mitigation Range is a Solid Hit. The effects of a Solid Hit resolve exactly as written. Straight to Damage Reduction, then the Hit Point pool.
The Raw Stats
Accuracy is the Accuracy attribute, some effects may provide bonuses.
Evasion is equal to 1 + Agility, + Awareness, + Accuracy.
Mitigation Range is a stat provided by the Armor you’re wearing, found in its description. There are effects that apply bonuses to this value.
Armor Durability is your Armor’s health pool.
Damage Reduction is equal to Vitality. Effects can add to raw Damage Reduction as well.
Examples of the Stats
In example, we will use +1 Agility, +2 Awareness, and +4 Accuracy. This with the base 1 from Evasion gives us a total of 8 Evasion.
We are wearing a mid sized armor. Light enough to move, but nowhere near impervious. It covers a good portion of our vital areas, and has a Mitigation Range of 6.
The Accuracy Rolls resolve in the following ways with these base stats.
A Roll of 1-7 Misses (Evasion Range)
A Roll of 8 is a Half Hit (Half Hit Range)
A Roll of 9-14 is an Armor Hit (Mitigation Range)
A Roll of 15-18 is a Solid Hit
A Roll of 19 + is a Direct Hit (18 is the Full Mitigation Range)
A Natural Maximum Roll (NatMax/Nat20) is a Critical Hit
How the numbers move with equipment, Examples:
The shorthand for the Mitigation for this example is 8-14-18.
If the Armor is removed, then the FMR becomes 8-11.
If we don partial armor with a MR of 3, it becomes 8-11-14
If we don Full Plate with an MR of 13, it becomes 8-21-24
At first, and even ongoing, we can write Mitigation out as:
1-7 Misses, 8 Half Hit, 9-14 Armor Hit
15-18 Solid Hit, 19+ Direct Hit.
To keep it clear. It’s a small learning curve, but the rewards is how much value it adds to the game as we introduce all the possible effects.
Critical Hit
A Critical Hit deals 10% of the Target’s Remaining Health as Bonus Damage. Hopefully with some cinematic plugs. This damage is figured and removed from the Target’s Hit Points by the Story Guide privately. There are Several Effects that can apply to Critical Hits.
Area of Effect
Everything in the area of an area of effect is affected.
This Foundation of Mechanics
These rules are to make the game more interesting. Winning may not always be guaranteed. Losing might be unexpected. Don’t we live for the Fantasy? The Drama?
Note
We may refine these rules from time to time. Especially for the sake of making them easier to understand while maintaining the essence of the core of the game.