System Overview

Foxville is a roleplaying game, and while intended to be played exclusively online through Discord, it functions in much the same way as other conventional tabletop RPGs. We use a system of rules to govern certain interactions within our game, rules that generally revolve around the use of dice. Rolling dice allows for dramatic, thrilling and unpredictable outcomes, and they've been used in RPGs for decades for this very reason! If you're new to tabletop style roleplaying games, you might be feeling a little bit nervous right about now, but don't fret. The system that we use here in Foxville is extremely simple and easy to learn, and as always, we're more than happy to answer any questions you might have.

The system we will be using here is a lightweight and flexible, highly narrative-focused set of rules that are designed to make character creation a breeze and to keep the game flowing smoothly. This is not a mechanically dense system and you should be able to fully understand how the game is played by the time you've finished reading through the character creation section. This page will serve as a general introduction to how the system works - what kind of dice do we roll, how and when do we roll them, and what do the results mean? How do the dice interact with our characters and the world around them? These questions and more will be answered here, and you'll get some examples of play to help you understand how the system works in practice.

Do I have your full attention now?~ Good! Let's get started.

The Basics

In Foxville, we roll six-sided dice (d6) as our primary means for resolving interactions. There is one specific situation where you roll a different type of die, a d100, but we'll get to that later in another section, so don't worry about it for now since it's quite niche! In any given situation, you will often have multiple dice to roll, and this is called your dice pool. For each dice that rolls a 5 or a 6, you score a success, and these will determine whether or not you achieve your goals. Your dice pool is a measure of how likely your character is to succeed in any given task, and reflects their skill, experience, natural talents, and physical advantages. You derive your dice pool from your character's base attributes and their skills, and you can sometimes add extra dice to your pool in certain niche situations as a result of your character's traits.

But when do we roll the dice? Do you need to roll dice to do everything? The answer is no! Here, we only roll dice in two situations: one, where the GM (that's me!) has called for a roll because your character is attempting something significantly challenging enough, or risky enough, that the outcome is uncertain. In this case, you will be told you need to accumulate a certain number of successes, more depending on the difficulty of the challenge. In the second situation, your character is attempting to directly oppose another character (player or NPC) in a contest of some kind, often a physical contest, but sometimes a mental or social one, too. Here, you are trying to accumulate more successes than your opponent, often to inflict damage or otherwise secure leverage and advantages. Below, we have two examples of play to help you understand how the system works in practice.

A bad roll of the dice and you too could find yourself in a very sticky situation, just like this one!

Anatomy of a Character

In the introduction, we talked a little bit about dice pools and how they come to be formed. Let's dig deeper into that now and discuss how your character is built. Naturally, you'll need to come up with a name and general concept for your character, but we'll be focusing specifically on their mechanical aspects here, so we'll start with the basic building blocks of your character, their base attributes. Every character possesses five basic attributes that allow them to interact with the world and overcome challenges. These attributes are core parts of their identity - their physical, mental, and social capabilities. The five attributes are as follows:

• Physique - Your character's physical strength, endurance, and health.
• Agility - Your character's coordination, reflexes, motor control, and speed.
• Intellect - Your character's intelligence, knowledge, and problem-solving skills.
• Will - Your character's mental fortitude, composure, determination, and emotional resilience.
• Charisma - Your character's social skills, charm, and ability to influence others.

At the very least, all characters you interact with in the game will possess at least one point in all of these attributes, but the average human will have 2 in each and perhaps one 3. You have seven points to spend when distributing your basic attributes (the first point in each is a freebie). The maximum number of points you can put in any attribute is 4. This means that player characters can be above average than the norm in at least two attributes, possibly more if they're willing to make sacrifices in other areas. The more points you put into an attribute, the more dice you'll have in your dice pool when you roll to overcome challenges. Much like people in the real world, some characters will be balanced, while others will lean more towards the extremes - strong, but slow. Smart, but weak. Charismatic, but with little impulse control. You get the idea! Let's revisit Jessica in presumably happier times, and take a look at her attribute spread and why her player might have chosen it.

• Physique (2d6) She watches what she eats, keeps herself in shape and might occasionally go for a jog or hit the gym, but she's got different priorities in life and wasn't born with a lot of natural strength.
• Agility (2d6) Jessica isn't exactly all thumbs, but she's not especially well coordinated either. She can run to catch a train, but don't expect her to win any races.
• Intellect (3d6) Working at Metaverse as a junior programmer, Jessica is quite bright and takes to learning new things with relative ease. Not a genius, but no slouch.
• Will (3d6) She didn't have the easiest life as a child, and was forced to grow up fast. She's tougher than she looks, and not so easily intimidated. She generally makes the right choices, even when they're hard.
• Charisma (2d6) She's not awkward, but she's not exactly the life of the party either. Her jokes sometimes land, and sometimes they don't. Dating is a bit of a struggle, but she's not hopeless.

Your base attributes generally remain static throughout the game, with some exceptions. They may be raised if you increase your predogen level to a certain breakpoint, but we'll talk all about that later. The main way in which your attributes might change is that you may occasionally suffer temporary damage to them, reducing your dice pools as a result. Damage is referred to in this system as 'misery,' and you accrue misery as a result of losing certain contested rolls. The reason you suffer misery is that someone eventually needs to lose a contest - if you're in a brawl for example, and you're the one who gets hit, you'll suffer some misery. Take too many hits, and you'll eventually be unable to fight back and will be at the mercy of your opponent. All attributes are theoretically vulnerable to misery in certain situations, but those that will most commonly interact with it are Physique and Will. We discuss misery in detail on the contested rolls page. You're almost done with the basics here, but let's first move on to the other major component in character creation: skills and traits.

A happy Jessica, before the world came crashing down around her.

Skilling Up

While base attributes serve as the core of your characters competencies and have the largest effect on your dice pools, skills determine your areas of expertise. Keep in mind that having a dice pool of 3d6 is actually sufficient on average to succeed in most low-level challenges, and that can be achieved purely through base attributes alone if you've got a natural talent for something. Think of skills as specialties that reflect your character's dedication to a specific field or practice - your attributes get you most of the way there, and your skills help to reduce the margin for error, and allow for exceptional successes. If your skill applies to a challenge or contested situation, you can add the number of points you have in it to your dicepool. Even one point in a skill is enough to suggest that you're quite well trained in it, at two points you're extremely competent, and at three points you're a master. We have quite a selection of skills to choose from in Foxville, but you can find them in the Skills and Traits page. For now, it's enough that you understand the general idea behind them. You have five points you can spend on skills at character creation, and you can put a maximum of 2 points into any one skill. As your character gains experience and develops during their time in the RP, you will be able to learn new skills and improve existing ones, but we'll talk about that later. Let's take a look at what skills Jessica might possess.

• Computing (2d6) Jessica has studied computer science since high school and has a very strong working knowledge of algorithms and programming languages.
• Medicine (1d6) She has been trained in first aid and has worked part time as a night nurse for the elderly.
• Persuasion (1d6) Not a natural charmer, but she's learned how to talk her way out of trouble and can be quite convincing when she puts her mind to it.
• Athletics (1d6) By going to the gym regularly and taking a morning jog to wake up, Jessica has got a leg up on the average couch potato.

But Jessica isn't completely finished just yet. There's one more major piece of the puzzle left in our little core systems triangle, and that's traits. Traits are special abilities, quirks, or features that your character possesses, they might give them a unique advantage in specific situations or provide them with exotic flavour that sets them apart from the crowd. Traits are a touch more complex than base attributes and skills in the sense that some are more impactful than others and therefore more expensive to buy during character creation. There are also flaws, which are optional negative traits that give your character weaknesses that could be exploited by other player characters and the GM. Purchasing flaws grants you extra trait points, and also adds some interesting depth and complexity to your character. There are many traits to purchase and some have specific requirements so you should consult the Skills and Traits page for the full details! You have seven points to spend during character creation and can receive a maximum of three extra points by taking flaws. Male characters receive one additional trait point to spend due to their inherent disadvantages. Additionally, all characters are allowed to take a single narrative trait of their choice for free! Here are some example traits that Jessica could have purchased.

• Good Memory (-2): You have an exceptional memory and can recall details and information with ease, even if you only saw or heard them once. You receive a +1 bonus to any rolls that involve memory recall.
• Attractive (-2): You are considered to be quite good looking, and this can be used in your advantage in social situations. You receive a +1 bonus to any rolls that involve charm or persuasion if your appearance is relevant to the situation.
• Natural Performer (-2): You have always had a talent for the arts, and you can sing, dance, or act with a natural grace and flair that captivates audiences. You receive a +1 bonus to any rolls that involve performance or artistic expression.
• Deep Roots (-1): Your family has lived in Foxville for generations, and you know the city like the back of your hand. People are more likely to trust you and give you the benefit of the doubt because of your long-standing connections to the community. You likely have friends in high places, which could prove vital in getting you out of serious trouble should you end up in a sticky predicament in the future.
• Pet Lover (-1): You have one or more pets that you care for, and they provide you with emotional support and companionship. They will also alert you to intrusions into your home.
• Well Off (Free): You are quite wealthy, certainly enough to the point where you can live a comfortable and even somewhat luxurious life in Foxville. You likely own your own home and have a good amount of disposable income to spend on whatever you want. This trait is a great way to represent a character who has a lot of money and resources at their disposal.
• Appealing Scent (+1): There is something about your natural scent that is unusually appealing to individuals with higher levels of predogen in their blood. You are more likely to draw the attention of a potential predator when in public spaces, such as a park or a nightclub, and are more likely to either be propositioned or even ambushed by them, at the GM's discretion. You also suffer a -1d6 penalty when trying to hide from a predator who is using their sense of smell to track you.

Traits add flavour to your character and can make them more unique and interesting. Also, cats. Everyone likes cats.

Predogen Level

There is one final aspect of character creation that we need to discuss, and that's your character's predogen level. As we've discussed at length throughout the site already, predogen is the all-important sex hormone that has come to dominate the human species in our setting. The more predogen you have in your system, the larger, stronger, and hungrier you tend to be. It makes you more aggressive, more sexually potent, and has a tendency to enhance your physical and sometimes even mental capabilities. If your level is high enough, you possess the capability to eat people - which, as fortune would have it, also happens to be the primary method of getting your levels even higher. Your character's predogen level is an abstraction of their ability to synthesise predogen in their system. Please note that getting a high predogen level is an optional endeavour and will require investment, and is therefore intended for characters who will likely be engaging in predatory, voracious activities. If your concept is more prey/victim orientated, you can completely skip this section.

There are some caveats to be aware of before we talk about how to determine your level, however. Firstly, your biological sex plays an important role in determing your starting predogen level. Women start at level one, verts start at two, and men don't have one. Yes, men are substantially disadvantaged in this world, and that's by design. To be capable of consuming another character, you need to have a level of at least three. You can spend trait points at character creation to increase your starting predogen level, though only as far as reaching level four. There are also specific traits that can be purchased increase your level even further. Apart from enabling you to engage in vore as a predator, predogen also has a number of other effects to be aware of. For every four levels, you may increase an attribute of your choice by +1d6. This allows you to push an attribute beyond the upper human limit of four, allowing you to reach up to 6d6 in a single attribute. Cosmetically speaking, higher predogen levels also often make you larger in some sense - you may grow larger breasts, thicker thighs, a more prominent ass, you might get more muscular, or taller. Often, there's some combination of all of these cosmetic changes happening at once, but we do not want to tell you exactly how your character ought to develop! Consider the table on height below guidance rather than a hard and fast rule.

You are able to increase your predogen level after the game has begun by consuming other characters, assuming you are capable of doing so. We will talk more about the specifics of character progression in another page though. For now, you should have gained a comprehensive understanding of the system basics and what to expect concerning the major decisions awaiting you during character creation. Time to start checking out the other pages in this category!

Digesting all of this information might take some time, but we're confident you'll get there in the end! Just like Jessica...