Introduction

This system came out of a desire to create a role-playing system with similarities to both the classic Dungeons & Dragons (largely based on 5e) and the flexible nature of the FATE system. It is also purposefully simplified so that it is easy for non-roleplayers to get started.

The core principles of Spindle are:

Collaborative storytelling. Like the systems that inspired it, Spindle expects players to be contributing to the story as much as the GM who is facilitating it.
Balanced and creative. Spindle doesn’t define what your characters can do, only the mechanisms through which they do them.
Easy to start, interesting to continue. Starting a story within the Spindle system is purposefully simple; as your characters grow, so does the complexity.

Definitions

We’ve tried to keep our acronyms and jargon to a minimum, but there are a few things that we will be using throughout this guide that are good to understand up front.

Character. An in-game person (or creature) whose actions shape the story being told.

Player. A real-life person who is playing Spindle, through role-playing as a particular character.

GM or “game master”. The real-life person who role-plays as any character that isn’t being controlled by a player. The GM also helps moderate and referee the game. In D&D, this is called the DM or “dungeon master”.

BBEG or “big bad evil guy”. A major opponent faced by the characters, often one that will shape the entire story being told.

TTRPG or “table-top role-playing game”. The type of game Spindle (and D&D, Pathfinder, FATE, etc) fall into.

Game Setup

Defining Abilities

Abilities are broad skill groups that categorize any action that a character might choose to make. For example, the Strength ability might encompass a wide variety of particular actions: landing a heavy punch, climbing a rope for a circus act, preventing a broken elevator door from closing, carrying a horse across a river, etc.

By default, we recommend playing with the same abilities used in D&D and Pathfinder (and many other systems): Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma. This is a tried and true ability framework that also makes it easier to transition to or from other tabletop systems. Unless otherwise specified, all of our examples will use this set of abilities.

But sometimes, the world you’re playing within warrants a different way of distributing actions and skills. In games with complex magic systems, you may want to build out an ability for each school of magic. In a cyberpunk setting, you may want to distinguish between tech abilities and real-world abilities. In a game rife with political machinations, you may want to define the different ways subterfuge and diplomacy affect a player’s skill.

The rules of thumb to follow when defining abilities for your world are:

Default to six abilities (and always stay within 4 - 8 abilities total). This allows everyone to build up familiarity with how each ability plays into the world.
Keep ability names short and understandable (ideally a single word). You’ll be referencing these abilities all the time, so choose terms that are easy to remember and use.
When in doubt, stick to the defaults. The abilities defined by D&D and Pathfinder are consistent for good reason — they’re very flexible to a variety of settings, and they translate easily to various actions.

Here are some ideas for setting-specific ability frameworks; feel free to use or tweak these if they fit what you’re looking for.

Elemental Magic.

Fire, Water, Earth, Air, Resilience, Harmony

Space Western.

Combat, Focus, Subtlety, Loyalty, Sweet-talking, Empathy

Cyberpunk.

Brawn, Stealth, Focus, Hacking, Cybernetics, Networking

Intrigue.

Diplomacy, Subterfuge, Resources, Connections, Influence, Ruthlessness

Creating Characters

Whether designing characters for yourself to play, or a set of opponents the players will encounter, character building within Spindle requires only the following:

Name. What this character is called.

Motivation. What drives this character forward (but may sometimes get in the way).

Flaw. What holds this character back (but on rare occasions, ends up being useful).

Characteristics & Lore. Any other features that make this character unique or memorable. This can include details like species or race, characterizations, style, mannerisms, groups the character belongs to, formative events in that character’s life, or anything else that may be relevant.

Oftentimes, a Spindle character can be summed up in a single sentence. For example:

Amanita (name) is a naive (flaw) wood-elf (characteristic) who needs to save the world from shadow (motivation).

Petrichor (name) is a French (characteristic) world-renowned acrobat (motivation) who likes to take risks (flaw).

A wandering raccoon (characteristics) called Scooter (name), who likes helping and guiding others (motivation), but can’t decide anything for themselves (flaw).

The single sentence version of a character is especially useful for GMs, as it's a very simple way to create memorable non-player characters (NPCs).

Ability Modifiers

A character’s abilities shape how likely they are to succeed or fail at a particular action. These are always tied to the abilities defined in the setting (or the standard abilities used in D&D and other systems: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma).

To start, a character has all ability modifiers set to 0, with a pool of 4 points to distribute across these abilities. You can also subtract from other abilities to add more points to that pool. This means you can heavily invest in a single ability and remain average in the rest, or invest in a few abilities at the detriment of others, or have most abilities be slightly above average, or any number of other configurations.

Each point modifies the character’s ability score by 1. For example, investing 2 points into Strength gives that character a +2 for Strength-based rolls (making it more likely that they will succeed at any Strength-based action). Similarly, if 2 points were subtracted from Dexterity, that character would then have a -2 for Dexterity-based rolls.

Here are some examples of valid distributions, using the standard D&D ability framework.

Character	STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
A beefy character who only ever focuses on brawn	+4	0	0	0	0	0
A hardy yogi who’s tired of the academic monastic life	0	+1	+2	-1	+2	0
A charismatic acrobat with brittle bone syndrome	-3	+3	-1	+1	+1	+3

Specializations

In any ability you have a non-zero score in, you can choose to add a specialization. This is a specific instance in which a particular ability might apply. Unlike abilities, these can be unique to a character or player rather than the setting (though you may still choose to decide on a set of standard specializations as a group).

Specializations (by definition) should be subsets of the ability as a whole. Your group / GM can veto overly-broad specializations. For example, a specialization of “knows everything” (in the Intelligence ability) is likely too broad, but “book-learned” could be appropriate in a world where books can only teach you so much.

Generally, you will only want to specialize in abilities that have a positive modifier, but if it makes sense for your character, you can also specialize in a negative ability (thus making the odds of success even lower). In exchange for using a specialization that makes it more likely for your character to fail, you may be able to take an additional ability point (or points) to offset — make sure to confirm with your group and/or GM about whether this is part of your game.

As you develop your character through the game, your GM may also suggest that your character take a negative specialization based on the way they’ve been interacting with the world. In this case, the specialization will not count against your allowed number of specializations. Negative specializations can often help tell a more interesting story – but you’re always welcome to decline the GMs suggestion if it doesn’t fit with how you see your character.

A character can choose a number of specializations up to 2 + their level. For example, a first-level character can select 3 specializations to start.

A specialization always doubles your regular ability score (and on a critical, quadruples). However, in situations where the specialization is not clearly applicable, you must convince the group that the specialization should apply.

In addition to your chosen specializations, sometimes your character’s identity will enhance or diminish your abilities in a particular situation. For example, a character with a flaw of “Brash” might find that their normally not-great Charisma score (-2) is made even worse when attending a soirée hosted by the nobility. If an aspect of your character’s identity might shape the outcome of an action, your GM may ask you to roll with either advantage or disadvantage as appropriate.

Focusing Specializations

Every time a character levels up, they gain access to a new specialization – this can add up to a lot of specializations to keep in your head! Instead of always adding a net-new specialization, you can choose to focus one of your current specializations. There’s two paths for this:

Subspecialization. You can create an even narrower specialization within a specialization you already have. This has the effect of quadrupling your ability score when both the broad original specialization and the more narrow specialization are in play.

For example, if a character has the “book-learned” specialization, you could add a subspecialization of “I learn the most from the dictionary”. When that character references a bit of knowledge that came from a book, they still have the 2x modifier from “book-learned” – but when referencing a word definition, they now add 4x of their INT ability score – 2x from “book-learned” and 2x from “I learn the most from dictionaries”.

Boosted Specialization. You can also simply reinvest your new specializations into a specialization you already have, increasing your multiplier when using that newly deepened specialization. However, to get to a boosted understanding of your specialization, you’ll end up needing to use multiple specializations – specifically 1 + the number of times you have already boosted this specialization.

Each time you deepen a specialization, you add an extra 2x to its multiplier. You can deepen a specialization multiple times; each deepening will require 1 more specialization than the previous deepening.

For example, if a character has the “book-learned” specialization with a 2x modifier right now, you could use 2 subsequent specializations to get “book-learned” to a 4x, then another 3 to get to a 6x, and so on.

Gameplay

Mechanics

Like other role playing systems, Spindle uses dice to introduce chance into the stories you are telling. Every roll in Spindle is made with a 20-sided die (or D20). A player only needs a single D20 to be able to play Spindle (and even then, all players at the table could share a D20).

We chose a D20 for a few reasons:

D20s are symbolic for roleplaying as a whole, and we wanted to honor that legacy.

The randomization of a D20 allows for a broader range of outcomes.

It’s just fun to roll a D20! They feel satisfyingly dramatic.

Generally, performing a particular action takes a single roll of a D20, whether that’s attacking, defending, casting a spell, or otherwise interacting with the world.

Usually, a D20 roll will occur in the context of a particular ability (with your GM specifying which ability or abilities can be used to modify the result). In this case, the actual result is calculated with the following:

(number rolled on the D20) + ( (relevant ability modifier) x (2 if a specialization applies; 1 otherwise) )

To see how this works in action, here’s an example, referencing one of the characters described above.

Our brittle-boned acrobat, Petrichor, is making a Strength roll. They get a 10 on the D20, which would be enough to be successful, except for the fact that they have a -3 modifier to Strength — their total result is thus a 7, so they do not manage to make the action they were attempting.

In contrast, when they are asked to make a Dexterity roll to evade an attack, they again roll a 10 on the D20, but now get to add their Dexterity modifier (+3) to the result. Because they also have a specialization in Acrobatics, they also get to double their Dexterity modifier, resulting in a final result of (10 + (3 * 2)) = 16.

Whether your result is high enough to achieve the action you were attempting depends on whether you are facing active or passive resistance.

Active Resistance

Generally, any roll you are making that directly affects another character will be met with active resistance (meaning that that character will also get to roll). In cases of active resistance, the difference between the two dice rolls are what matter, not the absolute number (though the absolute number might set the scene — if one character gets a 3 and their opponent a 2, the overall interaction might be described as clumsy, whereas an 18 vs a 19 is likely to demonstrate high skill on both characters’ parts)

In active resistance, there is always an instigator (the character who is performing the action being met with resistance) and a responder (the character who is responding to the instigator’s action).

If the instigator rolls higher than the responder, the action succeeds. The difference between the rolls determines how successful that action was; for example, in combat, the difference between the rolls determines how much damage was dealt.

If the responder rolls higher than the instigator, the action fails (usually with no further effect).

If the instigator and the responder tie, the action does not succeed, but the responder has a disadvantage in a subsequent action. For example, in combat, the reactor has no damage dealt to them, but they are at a disadvantage if they choose to attack.

In active resistance, a critical miss for one character can also count as a critical hit for their opponent (and vice versa).

Passive Resistance

Generally, an action that affects the environment will be met with passive resistance. In passive resistance, the GM determines how difficult a particular action should be. This can take into account information like characteristics of the character performing the action (e.g. a character who understands ASL will have an easier time communicating with a Deaf French character than a character who has never encountered sign language), but generally should be about the same difficulty for any character who may attempt it; that way, a character can put their abilities and specializations to work to accomplish more than a character without those skills.

GM Note. See the Setting Resistance section for more details on how to set an appropriate passive resistance.

Advantage and Disadvantage

Certain situations result in characters being at an advantage or disadvantage for their next roll. In both cases, the D20 is rolled twice: a character with advantage takes the higher of the two rolls, while a character with disadvantage takes the lower of the two rolls. These can stack (meaning that if you have advantage from two different sources, you roll 3 dice and take the highest of the 3) or cancel each other out (meaning that if you have both advantage and disadvantage, you go back to rolling just a single die).

Criticals

Rolling either a 20 (critical hit) or a 1 (critical miss) results in some special circumstances within Spindle (similar to other systems). These moments almost always make for more interesting games

Critical Miss

Rolling a natural 1 means that the action automatically fails. If this occurs within an active resistance check, this can be treated as a natural 20 for the opposing character.

Depending on the circumstance of the failure, a critical miss might result in you losing resilience points, energy points, or taking a consequence. For example, if you were attempting to climb a cliff, a critical miss might leave you with a moderate consequence of “Sprained Ankle”.

Critical Hit

Rolling a natural 20 means that the action automatically succeeds. If this occurs within an active resistance check, this can be treated as a natural 1 for the opposing character. In combat, a critical hit deals 2x the number of resilience points an attack would otherwise give.

If relevant to the circumstances, a critical hit also allows you to double the ability + specialization modifier applied to a roll. For example, if Petrichor (our brittle acrobat) is performing some acrobatic feat, they would normally add 6 (+3 Dexterity * 2 for the Acrobatics specialization); if they rolled a 20 on the dice, they could instead add 12 to the roll for a total result of 32. You can choose whether this is applied (so you don’t end up doubling a negative ability modifier and getting a worse result).

You can optionally also recognize “significant differences”, which are when a result is 10 or more points higher than the resistance against it. For example, getting a 18 would count as a significant difference against an opponent who rolled a 7.

Significant differences are not as impactful as critical hits or misses, so they don’t change how ability modifiers are applied nor how many resilience points are affected. Instead, a significant difference adds an energy point to the character who got the stronger result (even if the player already has a full set of energy points). This extra point lasts until the character rests.

Magic

If your setting has magic, any character with an above-zero ability modifier in whichever ability (or abilities) power magic in your setting can access that magic.

Spells within Spindle fall into four categories:

Offensive. Directly deals damage to an opposing character or object.

Defensive. Helps you and your allies effectively survive or deflect in combat situations.

Interpersonal. Affects the way that other characters think, feel, or behave.

Environmental. Changes the environment in meaningful ways, including bringing new characters into the environment.

The spell categories within Spindle are purposefully much simpler than that of systems like D&D, but there’s no reason you cannot use spells from more complex systems within Spindle. For D&D specifically, the schools of magic roughly map to the following:

Evocation → Offensive Spells (controlled by Intelligence)

Abjuration & Illusion → Defensive Spells (controlled by Wisdom)

Enchantment & Divination → Interpersonal Spells (controlled by Charisma)

Transmutation, Necromancy, & Conjuration → Environmental Spells (controlled by Intelligence or Wisdom)

To achieve the same level of potency as a corresponding D&D spell, you will need to use a number of energy points equal to that spell’s level. For example, for the effect produced by Fireball, you will need to spend 3 Energy Points.

By default, spells are cast with very low potency. At this level, spells can be cast any number of times, but the actual effect they produce is pretty limited. Like other skills and specializations, the power of a particular spell can be enhanced with Energy.

GM Note. See Setting Resistance for info on balancing the difficulty of environmental magic.

The specific way that your magic manifests is up to you, and can change based on the situation. You are also welcome to brainstorm with the group, and / or to land on standard ways magic applies to particular situations.

Energy

Every character has a pool of energy available to them that allows them to power-up their skills and abilities (this pool is equal to the character’s level). Energy powers both magical and non-magical skills, and any character can choose to take advantage of them.

Applying Energy

Applying a point of energy can be used in a few different ways, as determined by an individual player in the moment.

Add +2 to a dice roll.
Roll again (and take the better roll). This corresponds to giving yourself advantage and can be stacked.
Force another character to roll again (and take the worse roll). This corresponds to giving the other character disadvantage and can be stacked.
Perform an additional attack.

Energy points are always used in the context of another roll, and must be applied all at once (though you can choose to add energy points after you make the initial roll).

The specific way you use those points of energy you apply can be determined after you make that initial roll. For example, if you roll a 5 (needing to make a 10), and then choose to apply 3 points of energy, you can choose to spend one of those points as a re-roll and add +4 to the better result, or add +6 right away. However, you cannot apply 1 point of energy to reroll, discover you still did not meet the 10, and then continue using energy points until you make it.

GM Note. The application of energy points in Spindle is designed to encourage big bets (that may or may not pay off), but may result in players spending unnecessary energy points. If it’s a better fit for your game, you can instead allow energy points to be applied sequentially, based on the results of the previous energy point. In the example above, the player could choose to spend a single energy point to reroll, then only apply other energy points if that second roll was still below 10.

Borrowing Energy

In desperate situations, you may find yourself needing to extend your character farther than the energy they currently have available to them. In this case, you can choose to convert Resilience Points to a number of Energy Points equal to your level (with two Resilience Points transforming to one Energy Point). Your resilience points must stay above zero while borrowing energy.

Borrowing energy in this way results in your character needing some time to recover. The next time you rest, you only recover half of the resilience and energy points you would normally regain.

Resilience

Similar to energy, every character has a number of resilience points (a.k.a. health points or hit points) equal to 2x their level. These points represent the number of times a character can take damage before they fall unconscious.

Generally, characters are healthy and hardy, meaning that they are usually at full resilience. However, there are situations where a character may lose resilience points:

Being attacked by a character in combat.
Failing badly at a risky task (e.g. climbing up a cliff, skydiving without a parachute, casting a dangerous spell at a mirror, etc.)
Emphasizing critical story elements (e.g. becoming sick from a plague, being kidnapped by cultists, experiencing a traffic accident)

If a character takes damage after they’ve lost all of their resilience points, they are knocked out and not able to take actions unless another character revives them. Reviving an unconscious character is met with active resistance (meaning the unconscious player rolls against the revival attempt). If the roll succeeds or ties, the previously-unconscious character receives one resilience point (or two if the reviver rolled a critical hit).

By default, characters cannot die in Spindle by falling unconscious (which is true for both player and non-player characters — make sure you restrain the bad guys!). We chose this to emphasize continued storytelling, even in cases of failure. If as a group, you want to introduce a death mechanic though, we recommend using D&D’s death saving throws.

Recovering Resilience

Generally, the ability to recover resilience points will be tied to an ability within your game (e.g. wisdom). Any player with a non-negative score in that ability has the potential to recover their own resilience; players with an above-zero score in that ability can also help others recover resilience.

To recover a resilience point, a player rolls against a passive resistance of 10. If they roll above a 10, they regain one resilience point (or two resilience points on a critical).

Recovering resilience requires an action each time it is performed, but can be performed multiple times to recover more resilience points.

Rest

Characters regain Energy and Resilience points by resting. We recommend either adopting D&D style rest (which occurs in-game, and thus helps keep long gaming sessions interesting) or FATE style rest (which occurs out-of-game, and thus encourages shorter, more frequent sessions). Your group is also welcome to create your own rest system.

D&D Style

After a long rest (8 hours), all energy and resilience is restored.
After a short rest (>= 1 hour), one point of energy is restored and two resilience points are restored.

FATE Style

At the beginning of any play session, all energy and resilience is restored.

Combat

In many Spindle games, combat will be wholly avoidable; why fight the big bad when you can instead tie them up, mentally extract their secrets, and leave them for the local coven to deal with? However, if combat is an important part of your setting, we do have some suggested structure that ensures every character involved has the opportunity to shine.

GM Note. See Balancing an Encounter for info on how to build a set of opponents that will make for challenging-but-fair combat.

Combat occurs in zones (corresponding to a single room or ~20 feet), and commences through rounds, in which a character can take 2 actions. A character can act anywhere within their current zone.

Combat Actions

Attack.

Perform an attack on another character directly. This character will get the chance to defend.

Defending is not an action on its own, but it does require a roll from the defending character. Defending is usually modified either by a standard ability within your game (e.g. Constitution) or by the same ability being used for the attack (e.g. a Strength attack might be defended by a Strength defense). However, you can advocate for a different ability to make more sense for your character (e.g. our acrobat Petrichor might use Dexterity to defend).

You can only attack once per turn, unless you choose to spend an energy point. Even when spending an energy point, an attack takes one of your actions (though if you are spending multiple energy points, all extra attacks you are taking can be applied to a single action).

As long as it makes sense for the character, an attack can either be melee (e.g. hand-to-hand) or ranged (e.g. a blowdart). A melee attack can only apply to a character within your zone. Ranged attacks are best for attacking one-zone-over; using a ranged attack in the same zone where a character is located will result in a disadvantage for the attacker. The type of attack being made may shape what ability is relevant for the roll.

Move.

You can move from one zone of combat to an adjacent zone. In cases where your way is obstructed (e.g. a flaming beam, an opponent trying to prevent you from leaving), you may need to make a roll to successfully move.

Prepare.

Instead of taking a direct action, you can get ready for a subsequent attack or action. By taking this action, you (or a character of your choice) rolls advantage on a subsequent action taken (or when required to defend). You can choose to not use this advantage immediately, but it can only apply to a single action / active resistance roll.

Interact.

Make a change to the environment in which you are fighting, or perform a defensive or healing action. If this change would affect an opponent (or opponents), they get the chance to defend or evade the effect.

Dealing and Taking Damage

The difference between an attacker’s roll and the defender’s roll determines how much damage is dealt.

If the attacker rolls higher than the defender, the defender loses one resilience point.
If the defender rolls higher than the attacker, no damage is dealt to the defender.
If the attacker and defender tie, no damage is dealt to the defender, but the defender is at a disadvantage for their next action.
If the attacker critically hits or the defender critically misses, the defender loses two resilience points.
If the attacker critically misses or the defender critically hits, the attacker loses 1 resilience point.

Taking Consequences.

If a character takes damage when they have zero resilience points, they may elect to take a consequence to stay conscious, which is a concrete effect of damage. A consequence can absorb all damage dealt in a single attack.

A player can only have three simultaneous consequences, with each having a specific level of severity. The disadvantages applied by consequences stack, meaning that a character with all three levels of consequence rolls 4 D20s when attacking and takes the lowest of the 4.

If a character takes damage when they have no resilience points and three consequences, they fall unconscious.

GM Note. See NPC Combat for guidelines on how consequences apply to non-player characters.

Mild Consequence.

Mild consequences are easily treatable situations that are resolved as soon as the character is out of combat. While suffering a mild consequence, a character has disadvantage when trying to attack.

Representative Examples: Deep arm wound, freeze reaction

Moderate Consequence.

Moderate consequences are more serious conditions that are not immediately resolvable. A character with a moderate consequence experiences disadvantage on both attack and defense rolls. Moderate consequences are resolved when the character levels up.

Representative Examples: Broken arm, panic attack

Severe Consequences. Severe consequences are injuries or conditions that even with dedicated medical attention, will never be fully resolved. A player who is suffering a severe consequence has disadvantage on all rolls until the consequence is addressed. A player may choose to transform a severe consequence at a transformational level into a flaw, motivation, or characteristic (which may augment or replace the character’s current flaw / motivation / characteristics). Once the consequence is transformed, the character no longer rolls with disadvantage as a result of this consequence, and is free to take another severe consequence.

Representative Examples: Amputated arm, post-traumatic stress disorder

GM Note. See Addressing Severe Consequences for story-based ways a severe consequence might be resolved.

Leveling Up

When a character levels up, they can immediately do all of the following:

They can add a new specialization for an ability where they have a non-zero score
They add 1 to their total energy pool
They add 2 to their total resilience pool
They recover from any moderate consequence they took since leveling up
They can move a number of ability points equal to their level from one ability to another.

Additionally, every 5th level (e.g. level 5, 10, 15, 20, …) are considered transformational levels. When reaching a transformational level, a character can transform a severe consequence. They can also choose one of the following:

2 additional resilience points
2 additional ability points
2 additional specializations
2 additional energy points

Spindle uses a milestone experience system, meaning that the GM (or sometimes your group as a whole) determines what events or actions end up leading to players leveling up. Determining Milestones has more guidelines.

Last Thoughts

Spindle ultimately is all about telling interesting stories with your friends / family / enemies, etc. If you find that some of the structure we’ve described stands in the way of you telling a good story, we encourage tossing it and trying out different mechanisms that better suit your play-style. Like all game systems that we’ve enjoyed in the past, we want anyone playing Spindle to make it their own; house rules and modifications are encouraged.

We’ve also tried to make Spindle a good stepping stone to other more complex systems; there are tons of great systems out there to try that start from similar foundations to Spindle.

We’d love to hear what you get up to with Spindle; feel free to reach out to spindle@practically.cool to share your stories, feedback, questions, and anything else. And if you enjoy Spindle, please share it with others.