Rumble! The Core Rules

 Rumble is a GLoG hack for martial arts games in the style of Jackie Chan, Samuel Yao, Donnie Yen movies. It seeks to streamline martial arts combat while still making it fun and interesting. Because everyone loves fun and interesting! But not everyone loves crunch and built-in complexity.

Stats

You have five stats: Arms, Legs, Hands, Head, and Core.

When making your character, choose six Tags and distribute them across your stats. Each stat has to have at least 1 Tag or otherwise you're not being fun >:(.

The available tags are: Enduring, Powerful, Precise, Quick, and Reactionary. Each of them does something different.

 

1. Arms

Reactionary: attacks to this area are easier to dodge. You’re good at blocking hits within arms’ reach and moving attacks away from your body. 

Block a mook’s all-out assault with one hand.

Powerful: punches and slaps thrown deal more damage. You’re able to lift things better with your arms, and wield heavier weapons.

Punches break bones.

Precise: Punches go where you want them to, distance is precisely what you want it to be. If you block an attack with your arms and try to redirect it, you can do that better.

Throw a bullseye with a dart every time.

Enduring: your arms don’t get tired, and can take a beating.

Arm wrestle for days on end.

Quick: you punch lightning quick, and can probably fit extra punches into your turn.

Arms are a blur of motion in combat.

2. Legs

Reactionary: attacks to this area are easier to dodge. You’re good at blocking hits within legs’ reach and moving out of harm’s way.

Block a mook's all-out assault with one leg.

Powerful: Kicks and knees thrown deal more damage. You’re able to jump farther and higher.

Parkour back and forth up walls.

Precise: Kicks go where you want them to, distance is precisely what you want it to be. You have impeccable balance.

Stand one-legged on a wire, calm and balanced.

Enduring: Your legs don’t get tired, and can take a beating. You can run for a while without getting fatigued.

Run ultra-marathons.

Quick: You kick lightning quick, and can probably fit extra kicks into a turn.

Run across small bodies of water with a running start.

3. Hands

Reactionary: you can intercept things with your hands, if that does anything. Useful for tracking multiple opponents.

Catch a lightning-fast kick and redirect it.

Powerful: your grip strength is incredible.

Support your body by gripping with just your fingertips.

Precise: you can pluck things out of the air, if you can grab them.

Catch an arrow out of the air.

Enduring: your hands can take a helluva beating. They also don’t tire easily, say if you’re grappling with someone for a long time.

Punch a tree for 5 minutes straight without drawing blood.

Quick: you complete fine motor tasks incredibly fast, if you’re good at them.

Pick a lock in seconds. 

4. Head (a core personality trait. Not something flashy, or a catch line, but an undercurrent of your behavior).

Reactionary: you notice things super quickly. 

Powerful: you do not change your mental state easily (from fear or charm for example).

Precise: you are able to recall precise bits of information.

Enduring: you have mental fortitude, high pain tolerance.

Quick: you are generally intelligent and personable.

5. Core: adds a general +1 to checks of the core’s Tag.

Reactionary: you have a sixth sense for danger.

Powerful: your explosive movements just have a little bit of extra juice in them.

Precise: You have quite good proprioception, awareness of your body in space.

Enduring: you can take a hell of a beating, period.

Quick: You’re quite flexible.

Every time you level up, add a Tag to a Limb.

Checks

When the outcome is in question, roll (1d6)+0. Arms to do Arm things, Legs to do Leg things. 

Depending on why the outcome is in question, the person making the check may find that one of their limb's Tags is relevant! If so, improve the die count and modifier by 1, to (2d6)+1. This can continue to improve. 

Tasks of normal difficulty are a 4+ success. Extremely hard is 8+. Nigh-impossible is 12+, etc if you power-scale REALLLY hard. Opposed checks are just whoever rolls higher.

GM's can ask for a Check to complete a task and let the players argue what Tags are relevant (depending on how they're trying to solve the situation) or ask for a certain kind of Check, specifying the Limb and/or the Tag. Getting to the top of a chasm could be a Powerful/Enduring Hands check if you're climbing, or a Powerful Legs check if you're parkouring.

Combat

Initiative goes in the order of the person with the most Reactionary tags to the least. Ties go to Speed tags go to a coin toss.

Combat has 4 Steps, which go player-by-player:

1. Player moves if they want, and declares an attack on someone within range. If you move, subtract one from the results of Powerful dice rolled for damage on punches, and 2 for kicks (unless you walked on your hands, then its the opposite, but you probably can't do that).

2. Attacker chooses where they want their attack to land, and what limb they're attacking with. Fists can't hit legs unless you're a monkey or you're crouching. Hand attacks deal Half damage when all is said and done. Head attacks can hit the head or core and don't really do anything unless you're grabbing your opponent.

3. Defender chooses to block or dodge. Block: The defender must choose a limb to block with. Then they roll a Reactionary check. If they succeed, they take one damage, and additional damage for additional Powerful tags. Arms can block your upper body and Head, Legs can block your Legs and Core. If you take no damage from a block, you may try to redirect. Dodge: roll a Reactionary roll with the targeted limb to see if they dodge. They must move out of the way of the attack unless they roll a 6+, in which case they can choose to dodge in place. Moving out of the way means changing one’s tile. They can also crouch if they were punched, or jump if they were kicked (staying in place)

4. Attacker rolls damage by making a Powerful check with the attacking limb.

If the attack was blocked, deal any excess damage to the interposed limb. If the attack was dodged, the attack deals no damage, and the opponent must move 1 space (unless they dodged in place). If you deal damage, your opponent does not get to attack unless they succeed a Quick check with the desired limb, and you go before them next round.

5. Option to Redirect.

Defender makes a Precise check with the interposed limb. If they beat the damage roll, they may move their opponent one zone.

Tags in Combat:

1. With the attacking limb:

1. Reactionary: You can feint with that limb [# of Reactionary Tags] times per combat. Your opponent must reroll their defense dice.

2. Powerful: Rolling damage is a Powerful check, so the more Powerful you are, the more damage you deal.

3. Precise: Damage dice explode on 5-6 (5-6’s allow you to roll another die, continuously). If you attack with your legs or a weapon, your opponent must move closer to you to attack you.

4. Enduring: the health of the limb. A limb normally has 4 health: each enduring tag adds 3 more.

5. Quick: -[# of Quick Tags] from opponent's block/dodge die results.

2. With the defending limb:

1. Reactionary: how successfully you protect yourself.

2. Powerful: n/a

3. Precise: Tests to redirect.

4. Enduring: the health of the limb. A limb normally has 4 health: each enduring tag adds 3 more.

5. Quick: your ability to attack if you got attacked on a turn.

Rooms in Combat:

It's helpful to draw out the room you're in, just because range is important in combat. Worst comes to worst, divide a room into four zones by drawing two straight lines and roll 3d8 on one of the room charts to see what you find in that zone.

Rooms have stuff in them that you can use. Either say what stuff's in that room, or roll on the charts below. Using stuff to your advantage in combat can give you the win. Martial artists can do a lot of things, but no one likes getting a glass vase chucked at their head like a fastball.

You can also decide that things are located in certain places in rooms. More on that later, because it's not core.

Dodging Keywords:

- Dodge in Place: good Dodges let you choose not to move at all if you succeed on them. That's called Dodging in Place. Add a Quick or Precise tag to your attack next turn if you attack next turn.

- Crouch: you cannot Crouch next turn. -1 to the results of your Powerful die results for damage.

- Jump: you must succeed a Quick check to attack next turn, as if you'd been hit by an attack.

Health and Damage:

Every limb has 4 health, plus 3 for every Enduring template that limb has. If you take all the damage you can on a limb, suffer an injury, and you must take damage to your Core if that limb is targeted. If your Core is reduced to zero health, you cannot continue fighting. The bad guy probably either executes your or laughs maniacally as their eviiiiiil plan comes to fruition.

Weapons:

Ranged weapons can be used from zones other than the same one. Guns aren't a thing.

Light weapons (knives, small thrown objects, spiked boots, bottles) give your attacks a Quick tag.

Medium weapons (one-handed swords, clubs, vodka bottles, spears from range) give your attacks a Powerful tag and a Slow tag.

Heavy weapons (big swords, naginata) give your attacks two Powerful tags and a Slow tag, and opponents may always Dodge in Place against its attacks.

Slow: +2 to your opponent's Dodge results.

Specific weapons probably have cool properties. nunchucks and flails can keep spinning, meaning they gain a Quick tag on consecutive rounds of uninterrupted use; spears are worse when your opponent is in the same zone; spiked shoes improve Leg attacks instead of Arm attacks.

Up next: Auxiliary Rules! This includes some templates for the different schools (including two inspired in passing by deus ex parabola over at the super secret discord), rules for Mooks, and some expanded room rules/ some tables for random stuff in said rooms.