MOSAIC Strict Challenges and Obstacles

Challenges and Obstacles

You've got a series of traps, a cadre of guards, perhaps layers of countermeasures in a cyberspace hacking run. It's not a whole adventure, but it's not the sort of thing you resolve with a single skill check, either. Challenges occupy that space: a collection of obstacles that need to be tackled to clear the way to the characters' goal!

I devised this module after running into a recurring problem with "skill challenge" mechanics in various TTRPGs. If you assign a numeric rating to a problem the characters are trying to solve, and they have to reduce it to 0 to clear it, you're inevitably going to hit a situation where the characters take effective action but the numbers say you're not done yet. So you need to kludge some reason that they still have to work at it, bending the fiction to meet the abstraction of the mechanic.

In Challenges and Obstacles, every mechanical target is also a distinct entity in the fiction. It can be resolved or not, and might get more complicated, but you're never simply whittling down numbers--the action, and the challenge, are always moving in sync!

MOSAIC Strict? What's that?

MOSAIC Strict by Michael Prescott is a set of rules for making modular RPG subsystems. MOSAIC Strict documents can be added on to existing tabletop games, or mixed and matched to produce complete game experiences!

Inspirations and Further Reading

A Flexible Resolution Mechanic (also MOSAIC Strict!) by Liche's Libram

Dungeons & Dragons, Fourth Edition by Wizards of the Coast

FATE by Evil Hat Productions

Danger Patrol by John Harper

The 13th Fleet by Pinto

GURPS by Steve Jackson

Uncopyright

 To the extent possible under law, Edward "Sabe" Jones has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to MOSAIC Strict Challenges and Obstacles. This work is published from: United States.

Cover image: free resource from pexels.com by Johannes Plenio