There are four stats- Brawn, Finesse, Intellect and Spirit (In D&D terms, Str/Con, Dex, Int and Wis/Cha), each rated at d6, with an two points available at character creation to upgrade them (d6 to d8, d8 to d10 etc). Additionally, if you have a really good reason why you're doing it, you can drop a stat to d4 for an additional level of upgrade. No stat can start at d12 without GM permission. You'll need to derive a few values, like a Power pool and Fate pool, but we can deal with those later.

Skills is a list I need to work out, but I'm currently going for 16-20 skills, with 8-12 points for buying points in them at creation, with each skill starting at 0, then being upgraded to d4, d6 etc.

Runes is the fun bit. When using a runic spell, you take extra risks for extra gains. Each rune has a dice value attached to it- 1d4 for Minor (outer ring), 1d6 for Major (middle ring) and 1d8 for Greater (inner ring).

When you cast a runic spell, you use the runes you know to form a symbolic description of what you want it to do (For example, Scrying + Details + Sickness to discover the cure for a disease). The more runes you incorporate into a spell, the more powerful it is, but also the more risky.

A runic spell costs power points to cast, one for every Minor rune, two for every major and four for a Greater. Power points can also be used to enhance spells under certain circumstances, but we'll get to those later.

When casting a spell, roll every relevant rune (From the above example, 3d4, as Scrying, Details and Sickness are all minor runes). Say, the above roll came out 3 (Scrying), 4 (Details), 2 (Sickness). None of the dice have rolled ones, so none have miscast (we'll get to miscasts in a moment).

Now, you need to work out the total. First, take the highest number on the highest level rune- in this case 4, since we only have minor runes in the equation (Note- this does mean that, if you use only one major rune, or only one Greater rune in a spell, you base the power of the spells effect off that dice roll, with no choice in the matter, even if a weaker rune rolled higher). This number is the basic score for the spell. However, each additional rune is not wasted! For every successful (i.e. non-miscast) rune, you apply a modifier to your total- +1 for minor runes, +2 for major runes, and +3 for greater runes.

So, the final result of this spell would be a 6- 4 from Details, and +1 each from Scrying and Sickness. The GM would check this value against the target number, to determine if the spell was successful.

Try to make sure you remember which dice is for which rune, allocating it before you roll. Most of the time, this won't be important, as the dice sizes are the biggest clue, but in some circumstances its important.

After rolling all the dice for a spell, check that none of them have rolled a one. If any have, that aspect of the spell has miscast (Which is one reason why its important to remember which dice is for which rune). A miscast rune doesn't take hold, and is lost to the spell, leaving you with only a partial description of what you were trying to do. Sometimes, the spell works anyway. Other times, things go bad...

In case of the above spell, if the Sickness rune had rolled a 1, rather than a 2, it would have miscast. This would have ruined the spell, since without Sickness, there's nothing to target the detailed scrying that did succeed. However, not all is lost.

In some circumstances, such as when using an Anchored spell, taking extra time and care, or due to certain levels of Mastery, you can spend points from your power pool to empower your spells.

The most basic use of this, automatically applicable when you're casting in comfort and safety is spending one point to change a 1 to a 2, saving a rune from miscast. At higher levels of mastery or preparation, you can increase the size of your rune dice, or add to the final power of the spell.

I see you fancied up the chart some since last time I saw it (which I guess was a while), but it's a little hard to read.

However, Runes aren't all alone, most of the time- they're used in conjunction with a Stat and/or a Skill. From the above example, trying to discover a disease, in addition to the runes, you also have 1d8 Intellect, and 1d6 Medicine. You roll those too, and are left with your final set of values- 7 (Stat), 4 (Skill) and 6 (Rune). Against a TN of 6 (difficult), that'd yield a double success- from your Stat and Rune, and get you a long way towards saving people from the plague.

Thats the basics. Apologies if its badly written, I'm not 100% perfect on clarity of writing and so on. Any comments or ideas would be appreciated. I've got my Uni Exams still on at the moment, so I can't dedicate myself to refining these rules as yet, but after I'm done, I'll compile these rules into a useable format, as well as organizing and sorting the setting info, to make Mosaic a fully playable game! Then, there will be Playtests!

Note- those of you who've been following Mosaic will notice I haven't mentioned the different classes/styles of runic magic. They're an element of the setting I intend to keep, but I need to get the rule-basics down first, before I can start twisting them. Any ideas on how to adapt these rules to the various rune user types would be much appreciated. If you want to discuss them, feel free to drop into #Mosaic or #Vulcan- I'm in either.

>>4567333

I was kind enough to receive the aid of an awesome wanderer (Who was also responsible for the kickass Dive into the Sky logo), who redid the rune chart for me. As for it being hard to read... I've got a surprise coming along soon, which should be right up your alley.

Well, some classes are skill based, yeah? Somats dance, runefists punch, etc etc. How about something like, if their skill die succeeds, and is above the TN, the excess switches over to the spell? i.e. if the TN is 4, and they roll a 7, they boost the spells power by three, or something.

Rune of Bump!

Good progress in a homebrew? On page seven? I think not!