While Easy20 is stewing: Arkay: From the Mountains to the Sea

[Narf the Mouse]

First: This will not replace Easy20. I'm taking a week off, to let my thoughts settle, because I'm kinda blocked right now.

Arkay is a rules-medium, semi-life-path, roll-and-keep point-buy and random-roll character generation system.

Rules-medium:
The GM will moderate almost everything. There are very few charts which are only the costs of stats and skills relative to the bonus provided, one generic Difficulty level chart, one generic Modifier chart, a list of suggested skills, a sample equipment list, a list of "monsters" and a list of Qualities. Eight, in total.

Character Generation:
Character generation is a mix of random rolls and spending game-time in the form of months to generate Statistics and Skills.

Dice Rolling:
When rolling, the character rolls N dice and keeps Y dice. Dice are always d6's. This is designated NrkY or N "arkay" Y, such as 9rk5. The base roll dice depends on how many skills the character haw which can be allocated directly to the task. The base keep dice is the lowest of the relevant Stats - In keeping with the rules-light nature of the game, the GM will designate them.
3 Roll dice may be converted to 1 Keep dice and vice-versa.
Assistance rolls are versus a difficulty and the assisted character gains the Keep dice of successfully-assisting characters.

Acting:
Actions are made up of tasks. For example, the action of "I'm engaging in melee combat" could have tasks of attack, defense and movement.
Suppose they have a Melee of 6d, an Axe of 3d, a Light Armour of 4d, a Leather armour of 3d and an Athletics of 5d. They then could decide to put 1d Melee in attack, 2d Melee in defense, 3d Melee in movement and have 8d attack, 9d defense and 8d movement.
They'd then roll these and keep according to the lowest relevant stats (The GM would determine those based on their description of what they are doing)

Statistics:
Statistics are divided up into Power, Control, Speed and Endurance and Body, Mind and Spirit. The character will roll a die, typically 1d2 or 1d3, for the Stat base. The race and species of the character will specify the die or dice to roll.
The race and species of the character will also specify the base month cost, such as 6, 8, 12 or 18. For each doubling of months in a Stat, the Stat increases by +1.
For example, a Human has rolled a base Stat of 2 for Physical Power. They have a cost of 8 months for their Body Power and put in 32. That's 8->16->32, or three doublings, so they have a final Physical Power of k5.
Consulting the handy chart makes this easy.

Skills:
Skills provide dice to roll for tasks they are directly applicable to. The GM will determine if a skill is applicable; the Skill description will determine how it works.
Increasing a Skill by +1 costs (the new ranking in the Skill * 2), or 2 Months for a +1, 2 + 4 = 6 Months for a +2, 6 + 6 = 12 Months for a +3, 12 + 8 = 20 Months for a +4 and so on.
There will, of course, be a handy chart.
Skills also have a Talent ranking; this is generally 1d4-2. This is rolled when the character spends enough Months in a skill to gain a +1 Skill ranking. Your Skill total is Talent ranking + Skill ranking.
If you have no Months in a skill, the GM will determine how to handle that, such as take the average Talent roll, ignore Talent, roll Talent every time and so on.

Qualities:
Qualities define entities, objects and pretty much everything in the game world. They are recursively-defined. For example, let's take a Greatsword:

Greatsword
Qualities: Melee Weapon, Cutting (+2r vs Soft Armour, Unarmoured, -2r vs Hard Armour), Impact (+1r vs Flexible Armour), Heavy Weapon (Requires k6 for one-handed, +1r)
A greatsword is a 130 to 200 cm long sword, typically with a long handle and the first third of the blade dull and measured by a stopper. The weapon is typically wielded two-handed, with one hand on the handle and another alternately on the dulled third of the blade or also on the handle.
This setup allows a greatsword to be wielded almost as easily as a lighter sword.

A Melee Weapon can assist in attacking in melee combat. Melee Weapon is a Quality that derives from Weapon, which derives from Tool, which derives from Object.
Object->Tool->Weapon->Melee Weapon.
Each of these has a small and simple definition. An Object is a physical item with weight, size, shape and etc.; a Tool gives +NrkN - 1 (Such as +2rk1 for an Average Tool) to tasks it is relevant to; a Weapon is only relevant to attacking and a Melee Weapon is only relevant to melee combat.

A Superior Greatsword is a Melee Weapon which can assist in attacks with +3rk2 and is a physical object with a certain weight, size and shape.
It grants 2r versus the Soft Armour and Unarmoured Qualities and looses 2r versus the Hard Armour Quality (Cutting).
It grants a 1r versus the Flexible Armour Quality (Impact).
Unless you have 6k Physical Power, it's too heavy to wield in one hand. It also grants 2r (Heavy Weapon).

Hopefully all intuitive and easy to remember.

Semi-Life-path:
There are various professions, schools, guilds, backgrounds and etc. which give training in various skills. This includes skills not on the official list - Such as Sublime Sword Meditation, which allows practitioners to imbue their sword with Magic - Literally, or faster skill training, such as The Way of the Sword, which teaches only melee and sword skills and requires that practitioners speak no more than during one hour a week, but allows the student to learn faster than otherwise possible. These Life-Paths have a maximum of dice they may teach.

In addition, you may learn any skill the GM deems reasonable, up to the ranking they allow.