Cortex Prime is unlike any role playing game I've come across. It's not really a finished game. "It's a toolkit". Basically, you build your own world, your own rules. It's a system designed for Game Designers!
I've had this game on my hard drive for a few months now, despite it just dropping to DriveThruRPG yesterday, and when I initially looked at it, I wasn't looking for something I had to engineer, so I bounced. But now, after struggling to find a game system that meets my prerequisites, I think I might give this a go. After all, I've been toying with the idea of creating my own TTRPG for a few months now. I even got into the initial design phase a few months ago, but put the project down because of life.
Something I kinda like so far is the dice mechanic. It uses a combination of Dice Pool along with a Bell Curve. You get a number of dice, that range from d4 through d12, depending on how good you are at something (as I understand it), and you get between one and four dice to roll-- but you only add the two highest results. You do use a third result (the lowest dice size, I believe) as method of determining the effect, or consequence of your action. And you step up or step down these dice based on various circumstances. (I'll learn more about that after I get rid of this damned headache.)
Another interesting aspect of Cortex Prime is that there are no traditional Stat Blocks. No need to figure out what your character's Strength or Focus is. Instead, you have other deterministic keywords that are based upon who and what your character is defined as, and these values are assigned a dice size (d4, d6, d8, d10, or d12) The bigger the dice, the better your ability is. And there's a built in Hitch, or critical fail result anytime you roll a one on a die. Keeping in mind that this is on the result of any dice value landing on a one, so although the more dice you have available to roll, the better probability you'll roll over the Challenge, there's also the increased probability that you could roll ones as well.
Cortex Prime seems to be a great choice to build any fictional realm. So we could build a realm of Transformers, or Lord of the Rings, or even Sailor Moon if we wanted to, and all three of these realms would look completely different from each other despite using the same core rules source.
And apparently, Cortex Prime may be a good choice for Solo Play as well, but I'll let you know after I understand the game mechanics better.
I've had this game on my hard drive for a few months now, despite it just dropping to DriveThruRPG yesterday, and when I initially looked at it, I wasn't looking for something I had to engineer, so I bounced. But now, after struggling to find a game system that meets my prerequisites, I think I might give this a go. After all, I've been toying with the idea of creating my own TTRPG for a few months now. I even got into the initial design phase a few months ago, but put the project down because of life.
Something I kinda like so far is the dice mechanic. It uses a combination of Dice Pool along with a Bell Curve. You get a number of dice, that range from d4 through d12, depending on how good you are at something (as I understand it), and you get between one and four dice to roll-- but you only add the two highest results. You do use a third result (the lowest dice size, I believe) as method of determining the effect, or consequence of your action. And you step up or step down these dice based on various circumstances. (I'll learn more about that after I get rid of this damned headache.)
Another interesting aspect of Cortex Prime is that there are no traditional Stat Blocks. No need to figure out what your character's Strength or Focus is. Instead, you have other deterministic keywords that are based upon who and what your character is defined as, and these values are assigned a dice size (d4, d6, d8, d10, or d12) The bigger the dice, the better your ability is. And there's a built in Hitch, or critical fail result anytime you roll a one on a die. Keeping in mind that this is on the result of any dice value landing on a one, so although the more dice you have available to roll, the better probability you'll roll over the Challenge, there's also the increased probability that you could roll ones as well.
Cortex Prime seems to be a great choice to build any fictional realm. So we could build a realm of Transformers, or Lord of the Rings, or even Sailor Moon if we wanted to, and all three of these realms would look completely different from each other despite using the same core rules source.
And apparently, Cortex Prime may be a good choice for Solo Play as well, but I'll let you know after I understand the game mechanics better.
