Sailors & Storms
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Sailors & Storms is a roleplaying board game first published in 53 PC, based on the world and setting of the Utlian book series Adventures of Nyis. Created by the Rossan game company Lanterna and published by the Rossan government, the game sees the players take on the role of crewmembers of a ship lost in the Storm, which go on to explore strange islands beyond the reach of their imagination. Although explicitly based on the series, the game's non-rigid rules and a focus on roleplaying between the players allow for worldbuilding settings beyond the officially published material. The rules, primarily used to settle uncertainty in roleplay, have occasionally been criticized for being overly complicated due to their emphasis on realism, and have spawned a number of variations that have not been officially sanctioned. Though many player communities have come to use regional variations, such rulesets have never been published, due to Lanterna's insistence that they infringe on their game's publishing rights.
Setting
The world of Sailors & Storms takes place approximately one hundred years before the Grand Calming, with most of the technology used being adjusted to the time period. Traditionally the players take on the role of either a Rossan (popular variation) or an Utlian (classical variation) sailor - though other places of origin are possible - who, along with the other players, are the sole survivors of a crew-demolishing wave that leads their ship to get lost in the Storm, eventually re-emerging in a spot of calm surrounding an island yet undiscovered by their people. Promoting mostly fantastical storytelling, publishers discourage using existing islands to base the game's setting, and instead implore the use of new lands to keep up an atmosphere of unknowingness and suspense. A note included in the manual also warns about avoiding promoting harmful stereotypes about other nations of the Attu Archipelago. The officially published materials include several alternative maps of the islands surrounding either Utlia or La Rossa, based on the book series to varying degrees, though the official manual encourages creating one's own distinct world in addition to using the official material.
Although the settings are encouraged to be as distant from reality as possible, the game also sees a strong focus on the mundanity of the player characters. Acquiring food, water and shelter, as well as ship-repairs, all remain a crucial aspect of the adventures, and the players are encouraged to carefully think about the actions of their characters in order to survive in an unfamiliar world.
Rules
When starting the game for the first time, each player creates a character based on a number of personality archetypes, which tend to determine their abilities and skillsets, usually accompnaied with a defining story surrounding their character's past. Although players tend to have a defined place on the ship prior to getting lost, a rigid hierarchy does not have to be maintained should the players not choose so. The only exception to this is the player who takes on the role of Nyis, named after the ship in the original books. Unlike all the other players, Nyis does not actively participate in the game as an unchaging character, but rather serves as a storyteller who leads the world's setting and events, and serves to moderate the roleplay in case of disagreements - steering the ship along its journey.
Nyis is in complete control of the setting, bar only the decisions of the players. During the game, as the players wish to interact with the world, they will state to Nyis which decisions they take, to each of which Nyis will determine the consequences as the game progresses. In cases of uncertainty, rolls of six-sided dice are utilized, which need to surpass a predetermined number in order to succeed. To emphasize the differences in the abilities of the various characters, dice are removed or added in accordance with their skillsets.
As an example, Yyme, a crewmember of average ability in the use of firearms will roll three dice when hitting the target is not certain, adding their results to reach a final score. Unfortunately, his target, a glass bottle, lies at a hundred-meter distance, in order to hit which he needs to surpass a score of 15, at the far edges of his ability. Having made a life-threatening gambit to save his crew with the island's war-chief, missing his target will cost him his life. Calming himself down, Yyme rolls a four, a five, and a six, reaching a score of fifteen, shattering the bottle into pieces.
A different, pacifistic character would likely not have as much ability with firearms, and would only roll one or two dice, making the goal of 15 completely out of reach, making it impossible. An especially skillful character, on the other hand, would roll four or five dice, making hitting the bottle far more likely.
Combat
Similar rules translate to situations in combat, although far more rigor is used for every action to ensure fairness. Every round of combat in Sailors & Storms follows several phases, representing 4 seconds of real time in total. The turn phase sees each combatant roll dice to determine order of play, with the highest scoring roll awarding the first turn. The instant phase sees the involvement of all combatants who wish to use an instantaneous action, such as discharging their firearms. During the move phase, performed immediately after, all combatants move across the battlefield in order of play. Moving past an enemy allows for a melee attack to be made, and moving away from an enemy allows for an attack to be made against you. Only one attack, instantaneous or not, may be made per round. After the move phase finalizes, the attack phase allows for an attack to be made, if one has not been done prior. An action phase, done in order, allows for non-attack actions to be undertaken, provided that an attack has not been made. The minor phase allows for a single minor action to be performed, regardless of whether an attack or action was performed or not.
When an attack is being made, a roll of the appropriate skill is to be utilized. In order for an attack roll to hit an enemy, a combination of the enemy combatant's armor and dodge is to be used. Armor is a static characteristic dependent on the character's current wear or natural resistances. Dodge is a part of the character's skillset, and requires a roll when an attack against them is made. Heavier armor usually incurs penalties on the number of dice used for dodge rolls. Every subsequent attack against an enemy during a single turn removes a die from the dodge roll, making it more difficult to evade several attacks at once. An armor negation statistic, present on some weapons, allows for a certain number of points of armor to be negated down to a minimum of zero, although this has no impact on the dodge score. Once rolled, the armor statistic and dodge roll are added together, and compared with the attacker's roll.
A successful hit prompts a damage roll, which causes points to be taken from the target's health pool. The damage negation armor statistic, present on some pieces of armor, allows for points of damage to be negated down to a minimum of one. A character who reaches less than a tenth of their total health pool falls unconscious, and will require an ally's help in being woken up. A character who reaches zero health points is thrown onto the edge of death. A number of dice equal to the character's vitality is thrown each turn. A roll above a six allows the character to survive the turn, although they remain dying until given external help. Every turn, a single die is taken away from the character's vitality pool, until only a single die is left.
Despite the revolutionary popularity of the game, the combat system has been heavily criticized, prompting many variations among the playerbase that serve to streamline the ruleset in order to make it less tedious to play.