American Civil War II – Unisytem Rules we Use

Character Creation:
In our particular game we use All Flesh Must Be Eaten, specially the Archetype: Norms

Norms get:
14 Attribute Points
30 Skill Points
5 Qualities
10 possible Drawbacks

With the possible drawbacks you get extra points in character creation, you can buy Skills and Qualities at 1 on 1 rate but Attributes are more expensive, the cost of a attribute is equal to the next level you want to buy. For example Joey wants to upgrade his Strength from 3 to 4 so this will cost him 4 points you aquired with your Drawbacks (The initial 14 points you get for attributes is 1 on 1)

Primary Attributes:
These you buy with the 14 Attribute points (And drawback points) and later possibly with exp, you can never buy more than one level in a attribute after creation. The maximum is 5 for attributes and with exceptions 6 but this is far more expensive, 2 is a average score. Attribute points are spent on a one-for-one basis up to level five. Level six costs three points. If I want 3 strength, that costs three points. If I want 6 strength, that costs 8 points.

Strength – Determines LP, how much you can carry, how much melee damage you do.
Dexterity – Determines accuracy, speed, and the like.
Constitution – Determines LP, endurance, and similar things.
Intelligence – Determines how smart the character is.
Perception – Determines how alert the character is.
Willpower – Determines the character’s ability to resist things like fear and temptation.

Secondary Attributes:
Secondary Attribute is something you can’t buy these are simple calculations from your Primary Attributes.

Life Points – Your character’s health. Death does not occur at 0 Life Points, it’s a bit more complex than that. We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. Health is determined by adding your Strength and Constitution, multiplying the sum by 4, and adding 10. This is illustrated by the formula 4(s+c)+10. HP ranged from around 16 to 55ish. That may seem like a lot, but trust me, it isn’t. Injury is a Very Bad Thing, and getting into melee with three or four zombies is a good way to get yourself killed, no matter how much health you have.
Endurance Points – Determines how much physical exertion you can take before you become exhausted. Determined by adding your strength and constitution, multiplying the sum by 3, and adding 5. The formula is 3(s+c)+5.
Speed – Speed determines how fast you can run. Speed is determined by adding your constitution and dexterity, and multiplying that by 2. 2(d+c)
Essence Pool – Essence is your spiritual strength. It mostly has to do with Inspired, so we won’t use it much. Just in case we run into something that needs it, we’ll figure it anyway. Add all of your primary attributes together.

Qualities/Drawbacks:
This is the complicated part I was talking about earlier. Qualities are special bonuses for your character, and cost Quality Points. Drawbacks are special hindrances for your character, and give you Drawback Points. You start out with zero Drawback Points, and can get up to your Drawback Cap in points. Drawback Points can be spent on qualities and skills on a one-for-one basis. They can also be spent on attributes, but cost more. It costs 3 drawback points to raise an attribute from 2 to 3, 4 to raise it from 3 to 4, etc.

Qualities and Drawbacks are listed below. A Q means a quality, a D means a drawback, an X means it can be either. Next to the name will be its point value. V means the point value is variable. I’m not going to detail every single quality and drawback here. They’re mostly self-explanatory, and when one is more complicated I can explain it to you. All you have to do is ask.

Mental Qualities/Drawbacks:

D Addiction: V
Q Artistic Talent 3
X Charisma V
D Clown 1
D Covetous 1-3
D Cowardly 1-3
D Cruel 1-3
D Delusions V
D Emotional Problems V
Q Fast Reaction Time 2
D Honorable 1-3
D Humorless 1
D Lazy 2
Q Nerves of Steel 3
D Obsession 2
D Paranoid 2
Q Photographic Memory 2
D Reckless 2
D Recurring Nightmares 1
D Showoff 2
Q Situational Awareness 2
D Talentless 2
D Zealot 3

Physical:

X Acute/Impaired Senses 2
X Attractiveness V
Q Hard to kill 1-5
D Physical Disability V
Q Resistance V

Social:

D Adversary V
Q Contacts V
D Minority 1
Q Multiple Identities 2
X Resources V
D Secret V
X Status V

Drawbacks and Qualities are optional, but are good for fleshing out a character concept.

Skills

Skills are used in skill tests, much like in Dungeons and Dragons. You spend skill points on a one-for-one basis up to skill level 5. After five, each skill level costs three points, just like Attributes. The only difference is that you can raise a skill above 6.

There are also special skills, which are marked by an asterisk. These are the kinds of skills you must receive formal training for, and cost 2 points for one skill level up to 5, and 5 points per skill level past 5.

Some skills require you to specify a type. For example, the Guns skill requires you to specify what kind of gun you’re skilled in, such as rifles, shotguns, handguns, and the like. If it’s a very narrow range of types, I will list what types are available. If it is a broad range of types, I will simply put (Type) after the skill. I’ll put a bit of an explanation for skills whose uses aren’t obvious.

Skills are as follows:

Acrobatics*
Acting
Beautician
Brawling
Bureaucracy
Cheating
Climbing
Climbing
Computer Hacking
Computer Programming
Computers
Craft(Type)
Dancing(Type)
Demolitions
Disguise
Dodge
Driving(Type, as in car, motorcycle, etc)
Electronic Surveillance
Electronics
Engineer(Type)
Escapism
Fine Arts(Type)
First Aid
Gambling
Guns(Type)
Haggling
Hand Weapon(Type)
Humanities(Type, refers to things like science, literature, history)
Instruction
Intimidation
Language(Type)
Lock Picking(Mechanical or Electronic)
Martial Arts*
Mechanic
Medicine(Type)
Myth and Legend(Type)
Notice
Occult Knowledge*
Pick Pocket
Piloting(Type)
Play instrument(Type)
Questioning
Research/Investigation
Riding(Type)
Rituals(Type)
Running(Marathon or Dash)
Sciences(Type)
Seduction
Singing
Sleight of Hand
Smooth Talking
Sport(Type)
Stealth
Storytelling
Streetwise
Surveillance
Survival(Type, refers to type of terrain, as in Jungle, Forest, Mountains, etc.)
Swimming
Throwing
Tracking
Trance*
Traps
Unconventional Medicine(Type)
Veterinary medicine
Weight Lifting
Writing(Type, as in what kind of papers the person writes)

Possessions

[edit] The Rules
I will start to put the rules we use here one by one

Dice Checks:
Simple Checks: d10 + attribute x2
Difficult Checks: d10 + attribute
Trained skill Checks d10 + attribute + Skill
Untrained skill Checks d10 + attribute – 2
Close Combat Checks d10 + dexterity + Skill (be it brawling, handweapon or martial arts)
Ranged Combat Checks d10 + dexterity + Skill (Guns, etc etc)
I will add more soon
Combat Example
I’ll detail the rules a bit. The game system is very simple and elegant. Unless the outcome of something is important for the storyline, most things are abstracted out. Assuming you have plenty of time to do so, you won’t need to roll to do most simple things, like breaking a door down or setting up a simple barricade. If time is a factor, or the task is more complex, you will need to roll.

Let’s say Jim Halpert is being chased by zombie Pam, and needs to break down a door to get away. He must make an attribute test to force the door open. He rolls 1d10. Since it’s an easy task, the door isn’t very sturdy, he adds twice his strength score to the roll. A difficult task would only add his strength score. His strength is 2, so he’ll add 4 to the roll. He rolls a 5, adds 4, and gets a 9. This is just enough to break down the door, and he escapes zombie Pam.

Inside the room is a chainsaw and a .22 pistol. He grabs the pistol and shoots at Pam. Shooting is a skill test. He has 3 dexterity and 2 Gun(Pistol) skill. He rolls 1d10 and adds his dexterity and gun skill to the roll (You do NOT double your attribute for a skill test). A faster enemy would be able to dive to the floor and attempt to dodge the attack, but Pam is a zombie. She just shambles forward. Jim rolls a 2, and adds his bonuses for a 7! The shot misses.

Jim drops the gun and grabs the chainsaw. A melee attack is just like a ranged attack, but uses the hand weapon skill instead of the gun skill. Jim doesn’t have any Hand Weapon(Sword) skill, so he gets a -2 penalty on the roll. He rolls a 9, and gets a 10 after his bonuses and penalties. It hits! A chainsaw deals 1d10*The character’s strength. His strength is 2, so he does 1d10*2. He rolls an 8 and does 16 damage. First Pam’s armor is subtracted from his damage. Since she has no armor, she takes the full brunt of the attack. Since it’s a slashing weapon, all damage that penetrates her armor is doubled. She takes a whopping 32 points of damage!