Just looking for some good references and examples, of good games and/or good mechanics in-games that are used for managing game resources. Any sort; everything from ammo and torches, to stamina and mana, and whatever else you can think of. I enjoy video games with such mechanics, but know of few games that do it well. It's something I would like to research, but it's not a subject easily googled. One game that encapsulates my interests is Darkest Dungeon, wherein you must stock up on torches, food, medicines, and shovels before you head out, but you must also manage your character's health, conditions, and sanity. No one of these is the single main thing I'm interested in tracking down, it's just a game that serves as one example of the sort of stuff I'm interested in researching, and perhaps developing in the traditional games/table top RPG space.
On top of interesting mechanical concepts though, perhaps really a greater point of interest for me because I can't think of any clear ways to address it: actually keeping track of such things in play/practice. Sure, you could write a number or fill in a dot, and erase it/redraw it as needed, but that can become quickly tedious and obviously wear through the material being used rapidly. Dice kept on a face, coins or tokens flipped as needed, etc, all work well enough, but depending on the die can be precarious and prone to accidental movement, and/or just forcing you to fight that urge to fiddle with things while others are narrating. Custom made cards and sliders are all well and good, but drive up production costs and create items that have to be stored or replaced at the detriment of gameplay functionality.
TL;DR: Any good examples of games and/or game mechanics about managing literal or meta resources, and/or interesting methods for keeping track of such resources.
usage dies
>start with die tier of your choice, for example d8
>roll every time resource is expended
>on a 1, reduce die tier to d6
>and so on until resource is depleted or refilled to higher die tier
So here's the idea. You count the number of things used over time and compare that to the number of things in your inventory. You limit your inventory based on weight. I know its crazy but it works.
Sarcasm aside I tend to flavour hirelings and npcs with a number of less tangible things like
>Clever ideas [x] [ ] [ ]
and the player in charge of the hireling can use their resources like that. They tend to refresh when resting in a settlement and having some down time.
For keeping track of item use I have little cards from some warhammer game with 3 or 6 slots in it and get the players to keep track of things like torches or rations with a dice or token on those cards. Seems to help.
You don't have to erase much if you have a piece of scrap paper or notebook you take notes on during the game and then make more lasting alterations to character sheets as the reference document later. Tally marks are useful as a form of notation as well.
Useage dice are shit for most things though. They mean the ammo magically disappears without the player or character knowing its quantity during play. Its such a moronic mechanic the author threw a b***hfit when asked about it because he was too stupid to realize it sucked.
That being said, flat ammo rolls for games like old necromunda were interesting and effective enough but it was a different scale of game combat.
I always like this method for its simplicity and versatility, but at the same time I never use it because it just doesn’t feel right to track ammo or food etc this way.
A little too abstracted
I love this one and wanted to use something similar for my game, but it only uses D6.
Is there a trick I could use that would be similar statistically, but with only D6?
I was considering having something like "Roll 3 dice, if the three dice have the same results, drop one dice"
Usage dice is really good for tools like a whetstone or an axe, with ammo it doesn't make much sense
I quite like how I do it:
> resources are almost a kind of metacurrency
> spending or having them grants certain boons. Weapons give combat actions, rations help avoid exhaustion, money acts as a placeholder for new resources, etc.
> Resources are linked to physical items (if your airships blows up; you lose that resource), but an object isn’t a resource just because it’s on your person.
> you have to take the Gain A Resource action to gain a resource (duh). This involves a bit of chance, and the possibility for negative effects, which balances out vastly different backgrounds and assets. A wealthy PC is still going to have to Gain A Resource if they want to turn their latent billions into an actionable resource, same as the poor PC who Gains A Resource by working a day in the fields.
hijacking this thread cause I'm interested in it as well
Seems a but vague to me. Could you elaborate on how does Gain A Resource work exactly?
>Useage dice are shit for most things though. They mean the ammo magically disappears without the player or character knowing its quantity during play. Its such a moronic mechanic the author threw a b***hfit when asked about it because he was too stupid to realize it sucked.
This isn't the first time I've seen such dislike for usage dice. Why does no one seem to like them? I understand they are flawed in the sense that you can potentially have infinite resources if you roll well and especially on a high die tier it takes forever to deplete, but it seems like a neat little mechanic for consumables you want to track, but not monitor too closely. Also it doesn't magically disappear, right, you roll when you use the resource in question. The exact amount is unknown, yes, but it's clear that a d10 would be plenty, while a d4 means you're running dry.
>> how does Gain A Resource work exactly?
> Roll for it, adding a stat bonus (based on what you’re doing), and subtracting the desired resource’s tier (a measure of its rarity and/or power).
> pass, you get the resource.
> fail, bad shit happens. Maybe you suffer exhaustion or wounds, lose a different resource, encounter a new obstacle, or maybe events unfold in the background.
For an example of how flexible it is, both these are examples of gaining a resource:
> A woodsman goes out hunting for game.
> A drunkard seizes a broken bottle in the middle of a punchup.
how does your knife in the cutting board failure look?
presumably you drop the knife or maybe you cut yourself or maybe it's stuck in the cutting board because you stuck it through a cutting board instead of putting it in a knife block or a drawer or something
Consequences are pretty varied, ranging from emotional damage to prompting additional action from you. In Eulali’s case she might
> knock over her honey jars, losing that resource
> enter a combat phase (I’d go with this option)
> find herself rooted to the spot, losing access to a Sentiment bonus out of fear
> get mauled by the much faster creature
> have to flee as many more Mirlings smash through the windows and doors
Consequences can be used as either prescriptive (X mechanic is used, so explain it as Y) or descriptive (Y is happening, therefore X mechanic should be used), but I like to roll for two results and pick the one that makes the most sense.
NTA, though I think one version of something akin to resource dice that I've seen that I liked was the prospect of an archer running out of arrows in his quiver on a crit.
It's the sort of thing that in terms of resource management doesn't make that much sense, as an archer should be good at tracking their arrows. However, from a thematic sense, it's very cool, and leads to the sorts of cinematic moments you see where an archer reaches back, realizes they're out of arrows, and has to fall back on their secondary weapons.
If you track ammunition physically it's very rare that you'll ever see those situations. Of course, I'm not sure if this would work as well for other types of supplies. It works for ammunition because while running out of arrows in your quiver puts you under pressure in the middle of a fight, it doesn't stop you from getting more out of your pack to refill it afterwards. That's not so much the case for rations or torches that are consumed more slowly
So what resources do you want to track but not track closely? And in what circumstances is that a good idea for a game with resource management as a key part of the gameplay?
It works for wands in a sense if you want magical items found in the underworld to have an unknown quality to them. But for tracking ammunition, food, light, etc. its fricking moronic. You don't need to engineer cinematic tension, it literally already happens when tracking specific quantity.
>Why does no one seem to like them?
They are rather punishing for important consumables. I can understand using it for tracking armor durability, or things like the remaining duration of torches and lamp oil over X length of time. But for items that people tend to track precisely, like ammo/arrows, it can quickly cascade into an "oops, all gone" situation with just a couple unlucky rolls.
Let's say that an archer buys a d8 bundle of arrows for a journey. This should supposedly last them a damn good while on average (if you roll at the end of combat). But once in a blue moon that d8 bundle of arrows, supposedly identical to any other d8 bundle of arrows the archer could buy or would make, will be near spent after as few as 3 combats with archery. And this is what sticks with people, the edge cases when a single bad streak frustrated them.
I don't get the hate for usage dice either.
It DOES make the management easier.
Of course it's an abstraction, but if your game isn't about ressource management it's plenty good enough.
It's also great for ressources which are not easily quantifiable. For example bullets, in a modern or futuristic game:
When using automatic weapons, the specific amount of ammo used during a combat turn is going to vary a widely. Managing this bullet by bullet would be ridiculous.
I'm a fan of using "slots" for inventory, with a baseline of 6+/- the full Str modifier and their Con modifier/2, rounded up. Heavy weapons take up two slots, light weapons take up one, and stowaway weapons like daggers are free in terms of space. Five days' rations per slot, 100 coins per slot. Really gets most people more into it without impacting the resource management too much.
For a survival game I'm working on I've abstracted all "necessary" survival resources into simply "Resources". This is food, water, shelter etc. 1 Resource is one days worth of supplies for the whole party.
In the game travel time in a day is very important. Maximizing how much ground you can cover in one day is usually your measure of success. However, players may opt to spend some of that time Foraging which can yield between 1-3 Resources.
The first time players opt to Forage it is fully played out. Looking for food, tracking it, hunting it, finding water, etc. The results of this session are then "locked in" and are assumed to be repeatable. So if players choose to Forage, roleplay out the whole process, taking 4 in game hours and receiving 2 Resources at the end, at any time afterwards they can choose to Forage, take 4 hours and receive 2 Resources.
This is complicated by frequent events that might cause Resource loss and Biome changes that reset the Forage "lock in".
Doesn't it get trite to roleplay something when said roleplaying doesn't affect the results at all?