So I’ve been long at work on a #tabletop RPG system called Triptych, a slow burn project that gets attention whenever I feel like I’ve thoroughly thought a mechanical idea through. Triptych is designed to be lightweight and modular, independent from any specific setting so a GM easily can tailor it to fit their worldbuilding needs. It is dependent on GM Fiat and not heavy on details- more emphasis is on quickly understanding the few core rules and trusting your party to work out edge cases than turning every little detail into a thorough mechanical rubric.

Most importantly, Triptych is meant to be very quick and intuitive to learn, both for experienced tabletop players and those who have never touched the genre before. The crowd Triptych is trying to reach are those new players who see their friends spinning up a session and have always wanted to try tabletop, but don’t want to feel like they’re slowing the group down by reading the rules while everyone else is rolling character sheets. There are a few ways I try to accomplish this, and most of them depend on a rule of 3. The core rule set is meant to fit on 3 pages that can easily be copied or passed around the table during session. It covers 3 core systems of simplified gameplay which act as a fairly minimal framework for weaving a story and having fun. Creating a character involves splitting their traits by a rule of 3, which determines specialized skill checks available to them. On the GM side as well, adapting a setting to this system involves 3 basic pieces arranged into a riff. The riff can be as sprawling and interesting as the GM wants, and even include auxiliary mechanical systems specific to the setting if their world calls for it. Simple to learn should not mean restrictive in application.

I plan to release Triptych for free once I feel like it’s finished, along with a few sample riffs that make it easy to try out. I chose 3 common themes for the release riffs. Two of them, the space SciFi settting and the zombie setting, are intentionally very simple and interpretive, the details merely something for a party to shape something unique around. The third setting, fantasy, is another matter entirely. At this point I’ve spent more time on the fantasy setting than the core system. I’m going all out on this riff to show just how far you can extend this system if you want to invest the time as a GM into it. This is also because I’m having a lot of fun building this world and the secret war that takes place within it, the sort of occult laden old world apocalyptic alchemypunk setting I’ve had floating in my head for probably half my lifetime at this point.

While the final iteration of this riff isn’t ready yet, I want to start dropping breadcrumbs and bouncing story concepts off the outside world, even if they arent always totally finalized yet. The #TriptychRPG system is getting close to the point where I’m ready to test it more extensively in the world with the other 2 riffs, but this setting is going to take longer than originally planned since it’s the one I’m using to give the system a sense of identity. As a result in the future I’ll probably post some chunks of lore with the tag #Shorn to see if others are as interested to make a character in this world as I am to build it.