Godlike

Godlike
RPG published by Arc Dream Publishing
Rule System	One Roll Engine
Authors	Dennis Detwiller, Greg Stolze
First Publication	2001

Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 is the full title of an RPG from the designer of Delta Green, released in 2001. Set in an Alternate History World War II, it is a grimdark supers RPG in a setting where wearing brightly-coloured spandex will get you a sniper's bullet to the head - something most characters will not survive. It uses its own d10 based One Roll Engine, and has alternate d20 OGL rules. It has a a half dozen supplements and splatbooks, and a modern day sequel/spinoff called Wild Talents.

When World War II was beginning, a handful of people known as Talents developed strange powers that made them seem godlike to the rest of humanity. As the war heated up, these Talents were pushed to the forefront of the war, where they came to realise that their powers were almost pointless in the face of the horrors of war, and that their powers separated them from their comrades and the rest of humanity.

Splatbooks include two player oriented Intelligence Manuals (numbered 2 and 3 for some reason), containing additional player options, gear and background and five campaign books including Will to Power: The Nazi Parahuman Program 1936-1945 detailing the machinations of RuSHA SA—Rasse-und Siedlungshauptamt Sonderabteilung A (“Race and Settlement Office Special Department A”) — the Nazi program to exploit its super-human population, called "Übermenschen" (literally “Over-men” or “Super-men”) in an attempt to defeat the Allied super-human population (simply called “Talents”), and others detailing parahuman campaigns in Europe and the Pacific.

The One-Roll Engine uses a dice pool of d10s equal to the character's Stat and Skill similar to that used by Storyteller system. Since the dice are always d10s, a pool is written as the number of dice followed by a "d"; for example, a pool of six dice would be written "6d".

While most dice pool systems count the number of dice which roll above a certain number to determine success, the O.R.E. system instead depends on matching dice, such as a pair of dice showing 8 or three dice showing 2. Matching dice are called a "set"; the number of matching dice in a set is called the "Width", while the face up number on the dice is the set's "Height". Shorthand notation for writing results is Width x Height, so a pair of 8s would be written 2x8 and three 2s would be written 3x2.

A roll may have more than one set; the player can usually choose which one to use. If there are no matches, then the player may select a single die to act as a set with a Width of 1. In general, a set's Width determines the speed of an action, while the Height determines how successful the action was. In combat, Width and Height also determine the damage and hit location.

Powers, such as those possessed by superhuman Talents in Godlike, are modeled with special dice. "Hard Dice" are considered to always have a value of 10, while "Wiggle Dice" have a value assigned by the player after the rest of the pool is rolled. The shorthand notation for Hard Dice is hd and Wiggle Dice is wd, so a Dice pool of six regular dice, two Hard Dice and one Wiggle Die would be noted 6d+2hd+1wd.