I’ve been working on this hack for a while and done some solo playtests but im finally putting it to the test of a full campaign now which is exciting! it does something horrifying and apocryphal to the core of crown and skull, but in doing so streamlines a few issues ive consistently ran into with Crown and Skull st the table.
These issues are:
Players feel like their characters are too specialized and can’t do everything they want to do.
Players feel like losing their abilities completely after taking attrition is too harsh.
Players feel that flat rolls make low value skills meaningless.
Myself wanting to call for a group check of some kind and not everyone has the applicable skill.
When bringing this up to other gms I’ve been given plenty of advice that usually boils down to “tell them to suck it up, specialization is part of the game, same with the death spiral as you take more attrition” which i THEORETICALLY agree with. In practice however I find that making players comfortable (players, not their characters) allows for them to branch out from their 5th edition/Pathfinder 2 box and have a more enjoyable time; when doing stars and wishes at the end of every session, I’ve heard too many where people mention the system instead of anything that actually happened at the table. These aren’t issues with the system per se and I know if I had some different players I may not have these issues at all, but I love my players and want an easy way for us all to be happy.
SO
I took inspiration from my favorite video game Disco Elysium, a 2d6 skill based system where you have relatively low stats and you need to put points into skills to boost them, this means that while you still have stats for general stuff, you’re much better off boosting skills, which boosts specificity in character creation, something I find very important in crown and skull. Essentially characters have 4 stats ranging from 0-6 then they have their skill value ranging from 3-12, those numbers added together are what they roll against to make a skill check. this still keeps the minimum 3 maximum 18 value skills while letting players feel like they are more well rounded. This also adds stat checks, though they are pretty rare and more frequently used for saves, stat checks are stat+6 which will give a range of 6-12, basically replacing flat rolls, but with slightly less broad applications than flat rolls had.
I countered the relative buff PCs get from this in two ways; first, they get slightly fewer hero points at character creation (47 instead of 50), though that is negligible really. Second, my death mechanic means players are much less likely to have more than 1 skill worth 18 (if they have any at all).
I don’t have any intentions of publishing this, and if I do it will be in a few years once this has morphed into a completely different system barely recognizable as Crown and Skull, but I still want to share it with people and see what they think, and maybe it’ll help somebody else who has had these issues.
So without further explanation, here is my hack of Crown and Skull!
Character Creation:
STATS:
Brawn (strength, stamina, physical prowess), Finesse (agility, fine motor skills), Personality (people skills, holy magic, wit), Ingenuity (brainpower, logic, arcane magic),
Split 12 points between these stats, though one stat cannot exceed 6.
Tag Skill:
Your tag skill is what your character is best at, it gains an additional point at character creation, and has its, as well as all other skills under that stat, learning cap raised by 1.
Skills/Equipment:
You now get 35 hero points to spend on skills or equipment. Equipment is the same as the crown and skull rulebook. Skills however now cap out at 11 unless they are in a tagged skill group, in which case they cap out at 12. (this means that the highest possible skill is still an 18 but only for some skills. players may only have 10 total skills.
Skill Checks:
Add your skill value and your stat value together, e.g. a 3 in brawn and a 6 in goosebumps is a difficulty 9 roll.
Stat Checks:
Add your stat value to 6, e.g. a 6 in Personality means all flat Personality rolls are difficulty 12.
Attrition:
If you lose a skill to attrition you may still attempt that skill, but you must roll against your stat on its own, not as a stat check. The only exception is your tag skill which you can roll as a normal stat check.
Death/Injury:
If a player character dies they may choose to lose one of these Stats and the associated skills permanently and survive. The character is stable but unconscious and takes the injured flaw. This may be done 2 times before there is no coming back. All checks using this stat, and all skills associated with it are now treated as if they were lost to attrition (rolling against the stat value alone with no bonuses).
HARD CORE MODE (still less hardcore than RAW cus the PC doesn’t have to die): The affected stat is rolled randomly with a d4.
The last thing in the hack is just the skill list which currently is about 2/3rds copy and pasted from the book so I don’t really want to post it here, but you can use any skill list you want, from any game that has one, even video games! I have modified versions of the skills from Disco Elysium in there, I’m planning to add some skills from Deus Ex, etc etc. Just make sure to split them up under what stat they fit best with!
I’ll make some posts at some point as this hack begins the full party playtesting stage, but I’ve had a really fun time with it solo so I’m not too worried! Character creation with this system went fairly cleanly, the only issues were converting the stock CnS characters (half of the party) but the fresh characters were smooth as butter.
Have a good day y’all!