I've been eyeballing the Absolute Power RPG. And it uses Tri-Stat.

Anyone here have some experience with it? I know BESM is run on it. How does it handle? Pitfalls? What does it do well? How does task-resolution work? Is it good for long-term campaigning? Sandbox?

Short answer to remind myself to give you a longer/better one later. I played Silver Age Sentinels quite a bit, a lot of BESM (mostly the robot one) and the Tekumel game, so I've seen the system in action in various genres. It's a good system for anime, the original implementation. It is not a good universal system, in my opinion. Much like how HERO is really good for making supers and GURPS is excellent for gritty fantasy, TriStat is anime focused at its roots. It is definitely serviceable for other genres, but the underlying system lends to a certain style that might not be fully applicable. What it does well is allow for running games quickly with characters that are easily understood and defined and easy to run for newbies. Larger dice for rolls is intuitive to understand.

Stopping here because I need to think about this a bit more, but honestly if you like Savage Worlds I don't think TriStat is going to do much for you unless you want to run a Voltron or Power Rangers style game.

Less stats make it easier to build a strong character by focusing on one stat rather than 2-3 stats and conversely it makes it harder to have a dump stat that you can attack as a DM.

It's been a while. I really wanted to like Tri-stat DX, but it just didn't work out.

The Good (?)

At the time, it was liter than the other two supers games (M&M and Hero.)

It was sort of like Gurps on a diet. Roll-under, active dodge rolls, point-buy, advantages and disadvantages.

The 2d10 curve is a nice mechanic.

It combines Powers and Advantages into one list, which is interesting (What's your superpower? I'm rich.)

Unlike Gurps or Hero, there are no personality flaws, so you don't get extra points for "overconfident and curious."


The Bad (?)

Didn't like the three attribute concept, especially Body combining STR and AGI, a dichotomy which is a big thing in supers games. They created a "less capable" defect, where characters like the Hulk have a "High Body, but less capable in Agility" and Daredevil has a "High Body, but less capable in Strength." It seemed contrived and annoying.

Powers can be augmented with a universal Power Modifier Table, to increase their range, duration, targets, etc. We never played around much with this, but it looked highly abuse-able. Given that the game preface contains a manifesto that preaches "there are no problem rules, only problem players" they no doubt anticipated abuse.

Damage is a flat value, and then you roll dice to see if you do 100%, 75%, 50%, etc. of that. Felt sort of weird.

The dice scaling for genres seemed like a gimmick (2d6 for human level, 2d8 for action adventure, 2d10 for supers.) Seems like it would have been easier just to pick one dice mechanic and set different max levels for the traits.

Yeah, agreeing with Aglondir's Cons: having only three stats felt wrong. I'm in the "more Abilities is better" camp. Which sucks 'cuz I really wanted to like The Authority RPG after the Bryan Hitch art reeled me in. Probably need to convert it to Marvel Super Heroes at some point 

Huh, body/mind/soul sounds bad... STR/AGI/INT would be much better, but I think four stats is about the minimum for me.

My main exposure to Tri-stat was from one of my players who was into their BESM RPG and so had a look at it.

Pros: Very flexible system. BESM had books covering all sorts of genres.

Cons: Very flexible system. Like gurps you need to both know the system well to get it to do what you want, and know what branches to prune from player access.

Would adding relevant stats help?

Quote from: tenbones on May 18, 2023, 05:05:21 PM
Would adding relevant stats help?

Maybe, but it's going to cascade downwards. I started an attempt:

1. Body -> STR and DEX

2. Mind -> INT and PER

3. Soul - > CHA and WIL

4. Attack Value... Instead of explaining it, I will just quote the game's mumbo-jumbo:

QuoteIncreased skill in combat can only be achieved through harmony of the Complete Self. Lack of self-unity through weakness of any facet of the  character will restrict his or her ability in combat. Consequently, the Body, Mind, and Soul are all of equal importance to the combat master: Body Stat for a forceful attack and defence, Mind Stat for quick wit, knowledge of combat techniques and anticipation of an opponent's actions, and Soul Stat for the winning spirit and good fortune.

Basically your Attack Value = (B+M+S)/3. if you like that concept, then the new way would be (sum of all atts)/6. If you want a more classic approach, your AV for close combat = STR, and AV for ranged combat = DEX.

5. Defense Value (AV-2) stays the same if you like the mumbo-jumbo, or becomes DEX-2 if you like a classic approach.

6. HP (previously B+S*5) becomes STR + WIL * 5.


At this point, I think it's a different game. Better? Worse? You decide.

Quote from: Theory of Games on May 18, 2023, 11:09:19 AM
Yeah, agreeing with Aglondir's Cons: having only three stats felt wrong. I'm in the "more Abilities is better" camp. Which sucks 'cuz I really wanted to like The Authority RPG after the Bryan Hitch art reeled me in. Probably need to convert it to Marvel Super Heroes at some point 

I have The Authority! Love the art and the stories behind the comics. Yeah, an MSH version would rock. I also have their cyberpunk game, Ex Machina. It's got some cool ideas for campaigns. Might be dated by now, it's been a while.

Quote from: tenbones on May 17, 2023, 09:29:22 PM
I've been eyeballing the Absolute Power RPG. And it uses Tri-Stat.

Anyone here have some experience with it? I know BESM is run on it. How does it handle? Pitfalls? What does it do well? How does task-resolution work? Is it good for long-term campaigning? Sandbox?

If point-buy character and ability creation is your thing ala GURPS, M&M, or HERO, Tri-Stat falls within the same camp.

Never have played Absolute Power RPG, but I think it's like a second edition of Silver Age Sentinels. The switch from 2d6 to 2d10 seemed nonsensical, especially since BESM (the original Tri-Stat game) went roll-over from 3e onwards.

I also suspect that the abilities between Absolute Power and BESM 4e are nearly identical. If that's the case, then modifying abilities is pretty easy: each modifier will effectively lower the level of the ability (if beneficial) or raise the level of the ability (if detrimental) in lieu of modifying its cost.

Other than that, I'd suspect that it has a very similar amount of viability towards long-term campaigns as either HERO, GURPS, or M&M (if it still uses 2d10 due to the larger number range). But then again, we're talking about supers, which are notorious for being largely static in ability and reactive and status-quo oriented.

My experience with Tri-Stat (BESM, SAS) is that while technically you can make any character with the building blocks provided, in practice it isn't obvious how you should do it. The old GoO boards were full of posts asking how to stat up a particular character concept. I don't know if there's an active community helping people realize build concepts with Tri-Stat nowadays.

Quote from: migo on May 19, 2023, 03:19:03 AM
My experience with Tri-Stat (BESM, SAS) is that while technically you can make any character with the building blocks provided, in practice it isn't obvious how you should do it. The old GoO boards were full of posts asking how to stat up a particular character concept. I don't know if there's an active community helping people realize build concepts with Tri-Stat nowadays.

Mark MacKinnon (the creator of Tri-Stat and the product lines that use it) is most likely a great contributor to the lack of a community of people rralizong build concepts with Tri-Stat due to his notoriety for not paying freelancers who worked for him in the past.

Quote from: ronwisegamgee on May 19, 2023, 06:02:41 AM
Mark MacKinnon (the creator of Tri-Stat and the product lines that use it) is most likely a great contributor to the lack of a community of people rralizong build concepts with Tri-Stat due to his notoriety for not paying freelancers who worked for him in the past.

Ah, I forgot all about that shit!

The most recent version of Tri-Stat was released with SAS as a generic game last year. (Disclaimer: DTRPG links are affiliate links.)

Gone are the different dice for scaling. Everything uses 2D6 now. Instead of modifiers, you have;

Major Obstacle = Roll 4d6, take two lowest results.
Minor Obstacle = Roll 3d6, take two lowest results.
Normal Roll = Roll 2d6 + Stat + Skill (if used)
Minor Edge = Roll 3d6, take two highest results.
Major Edge = Roll 4d6, take two highest results.

You can see a screenshot of the target numbers and margin of success in this Google Drive.

The Tri-Stat PDF is cheap (7.95) and the printed book is 14.95 on the Dyskami Publishing site.

It's not a super complicated game. The most complicated is customizing Attributes (powers). Skills are essentially Attributes and default to groups in the base game. The new BESM Extras book (compatible with Tri-Stat and Silver Age Sentinels) has tons of options within, including the skill list and costing options from the previous edition.

I like the Attributes. They remind me of HERO but WAY less fidgety and complicated. The character sheet obscures a little of the complexity. I built a Google Sheets version inspired by a fan-made sheet on the InterTubes. It includes room for the optional Skills system (which I prefer).

You can see a list of Attributes (screenshot) in the google drive linked above.

I think this would work fine as a generic system. Especially if you show up with the generic Tri-Stat game and reference BESM or SAS when you need other options or Attributes. I have not played the new edition. After my move, I would be interested in running a game online and see how it plays. It reads as if it plays fast.

Other News: Mark doesn't seem to have a lot of love in the industry, but the game seems to be doing ok. Not a lot of buzz out there about it (actual plays, discussion, or reviews). It has a program you can publish on DTRPG with it and freely downloadable assets to use for that program. Only one real release thus far; three cyberpunk books that comprise a generic primer on the genre.