alphaomegathegame.comThe Third Die — a register of tabletop mechanisms

Register · Open · 29 entries · 5 sections

Every mechanism, taken apart

A tabletop roleplaying game is a machine, and you can see the workings. Every entry is a mechanism examined on its own, with the arithmetic shown and the table consequence stated. No system is treated as canonical.

Start with entry 001 — Why 3d6 is not a d20Browse all 29
A table an hour into a session, shot square from above
FIG.01The machine mid-session. Every part is visible at once, which is exactly why none of them get looked at.Photo: Nika Benedictova / Pexels

The register

Ref · Section · Entry · What it does · Length
RefSectionEntryWhat it doesLength
001 Randomness Why 3d6 is not a d20 Same average, completely different game. 003 Randomness Adding dice narrows it Two dice make a triangle, three make a bell. 008 Numbers What a difficulty number says A target number is a claim about how often the thing should happen. 009 Numbers Bonuses outrun the die When modifiers grow faster than the die's range, the roll stops mattering. 014 Encounters What a fight costs Encounter budgets price a fight before anybody rolls. 018 Encounters Morale The rule that ends fights early. 021 The Sheet What belongs in the top third The things reached for every round versus the things reached for once a session, and why most sheets have that backwards. 028 The Table From wargames Scale, facing, morale and the six-second round all came from moving blocks of troops.

Open the full register — 29 entries →

Hand-written index cards fanned out on a table
FIG.02Every table ends up with a second, handwritten ruleset beside the printed one. It is usually the one that gets used.Photo: George Diamanto / Pexels

Entry 020 · The Sheet

The character sheet is an interface, and it was designed by accident

Everything a player does passes through one page. Grouping, reading order, and the numbers that get looked up most often.

Read entry 020 →
A character sheet soft with pencil and eraser marks
FIG.03Reading order, imposed. The eye starts where the printer decided the boxes should start.Photo: cottonbro studio / Pexels

Sections

Five · 29 entries

Randomness

Curves, flat lines, and what each one feels like.

07 entries

Numbers

Difficulty, budgets, and the arithmetic under a session.

06 entries

Encounters

What a fight costs before anybody rolls.

06 entries

The Sheet

The character sheet as a piece of interface design.

05 entries

The Table

Five people, one rulebook, and what actually happens.

05 entries

Supporters

Tables we sit beside.

How to read this register

Each entry names one part of the machine, shows the arithmetic that drives it, and states the consequence at a table. Nothing here is written as a rules quotation and no system is treated as canonical — where a mechanism is described, it is described in our own words.

  1. 01

    Name the part

    One mechanism per entry, isolated from the system it arrived in.

  2. 02

    Show the arithmetic

    The numbers that make it behave the way it does, worked through rather than asserted.

  3. 03

    State the consequence

    What changes at a real table when the part is present, altered, or taken out.