The Rules Dump

This game is based on the 5+ system, developed by CESN (with some help from me).
The system is still in development and this game is intended to be a playtest of the system as well as just a fun one shot in a relatively simple system.

The full rules document can be found here. But, as that ruleset is mostly intended as a toolbox for GMs, there are a number of optional rules in there that we will not be using in this particular game and some small changes I've made from the base system. All relevant rules will be described in this forum and wherever the rules in this forum clash with the rules in the document, the ones in this forum are correct for this game.

All the information you need to play this game will be in this forum. I am just linking the document for extra context and if any of you are interested in checking it out, feel free to do so (and let CESN and me know what you think).

The Character Sheet Template can be found here

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Origin/Upbringing/Class
These are the choices you make at the three steps of character creation.
Origin refers to your character’s "race", Upbringing to the environment they grew up in and class is their class.
At each of these steps, you will get to apply some modifications to your character’s stats and choose between different options for traits and abilities.

Resistances
The resistances function like Hit Points. If your damage exceeds your maximum hit points, you take a wound and reset all damage to 0. If your wounds exceed your resistance tier (1 in this game), you will be taken out of the scene. Depending on the situation, this can take different forms. You might for example fall unconscious, stomp off in anger or even die.
There are three resistance tracks.
Physical Resistance is used for physical damage such as when you get hit by a bullet or fall off the edge of a building.
Mental Resistance is used for mental damage. That could be a particularly cutting insult or an attack on your consciousness while it is separated from your body.
Fatigue Resistance mostly comes into play when you activate special abilities or exert yourself to turn a failure into a possible success but some abilities or attacks can also target Fatigue Resistance instead of one of the others.

Wounds/Conditions
This section is reserved for Wounds or Conditions that your character takes during the game. After getting seriously injured in a fight, your character might have a Broken Arm (Physical). This will apply a -1 penalty to all actions in which an unbroken arm would be advantageous. Furthermore, if a character takes more wounds of one type (Physical/Mental/Fatigue) than their tier in the corresponding resistance (1), they are taken out of the scene.

Traits
Traits are special characteristics of your character. They can either apply bonuses or penalties to actions or they can open up new moves or maneuvers that are not available to other characters.
If a trait allows you to apply a +1 bonus to an action, you may invoke it whenever the trait as described applies to an action you are attempting. For any one action, you may only ever invoke up to two traits at once (gaining a total bonus of +2).
If a trait allows you to apply a -1 penalty to an action, you may choose to do so any time, the trait as described applies to what you are trying to do. This of course makes your action harder but in return, you may mark the skill you used by putting an asterisk in front of it on your character sheet. This mark may later be used to try and level up this skill [See here for more].
If a trait opens up a new move or maneuver, you may make use of it whenever you want. You don’t have to spend Fatigue to activate it and you are not limited in how often you want to use it.
With the character choices available in this adventure, Class Traits open up new moves or maneuvers, while Origin Traits and Upbringing Traits provide opportunities to apply bonuses or penalties.

Skills
Skills are the basis of most rolls in the game. The details can be found here but for now, the most important thing to note is that skill values range from 1 to 6 and can be leveled up during the game as described here. Every action that requires a roll is covered by a skill. The higher the skill number, the higher the chances of success.
The base rules also allow for a skill to increase to a higher tier to allow for long-term play but since this adventure is designed as a one-shot, those rules will not be used. The tier for all PC actions is considered 1 unless specified otherwise.

Abilities

Abilities are special moves that, unlike the moves granted by traits, are limited in how often they can be used. Every time, an ability is called, the character takes one point of Fatigue damage. All abilities also require a roll to be made. If that roll is unsuccessful, the character still takes the Fatigue damage but the ability fails.

Equipment

In this game, there will be no need to take stock of every item your characters are carrying. If it makes sense for a character to have something on them, they can have it. That will be decided in the moment.
The only things that are important to be determined at the start are armor and weapons.
Every character may start the game with one piece of armor and up to two weapons. You may choose freely what kind of equipment your character should possess and the GM will assign stats to your equipment. Heavier armor might carry penalties to certain types of actions or other downsides for balance. The same might apply to weapons with high armor penetration values.

All rolls are made with 2D6. Unlike other systems, you are not aiming for high or low results but instead, in order to succeed, the result of the two dice added together has to fall into a Success Range.
As the name of the system, 5+, implies, the lower bound of that Success Range is 5 while the higher bound is determined by the character’s skills, traits and other modifiers. This is done because 2D6 create a bellcurve (bellpyramid?) with the middle results being more likely than the extremes.

If you lay out the possible results of a die roll of 2D6 in a line, you would get something like this:
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

At a total modifier to a roll of 0, the upper bond would be set at [5+0=]5. Therefore, only a 5 would lead to a successful roll. This is represented by the brackets in the following line up:
2 3 4 [ 5 ] 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

At a total modifier to a roll of 3 the upper bond would be set at [5+3=]8. Therefore, a 5, 6, 7 or 8 would all be successful roll results.
2 3 4 [ 5 6 7 8 ] 9 10 11 12

Example

An electronic lock is keeping the PCs out of a room they desperately need to get into. The group’s engineer decides to attempt to hack it open. Initially, the success range looks like this:
2 3 4 [ 5 ] 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
The engineer has a hacking skill level of 3, so the upper bound of the success range is moved three spaces to the right to include [5+3=]8:
2 3 4 [ 5 6 7 8 ] 9 10 11 12
The engineer also has a trait that applies in this situation that can give them a bonus of +1 to their roll. The success range is moved one more space to the right to include [8+1=]9:
2 3 4 [ 5 6 7 8 9 ] 10 11 12
Another PC decides to help the engineer with this roll, providing an additional +1 bonus to the roll and moving the success range another space to the right. Now, the SR includes [9+1=]10 as well:
2 3 4 [ 5 6 7 8 9 10 ] 11 12
The GM reminds the player that the engineer has a wound that applies to this situation: Burned Out (Fatigue). The wound applies a -1 penalty to this roll, moving the upper bound left by one space. The new and final upper bound is at [10-1=]9:
2 3 4 [ 5 6 7 8 9 ] 10 11 12

When the engineer makes the roll, they label the roll as:
Hacking 3, +1 Trait, +1 Help, -1 Wound -> SR: 5-9
A total roll result of 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9 will count as a success for this hacking attempt. That is a success chance of 66,7% or 2/3.

Resistance Rolls

While most rolls are performed using Skills, occasionally, it might become necessary to roll for a resistance instead. This will mostly come up for recovery during a rest or to resist certain attacks or effects.
The effective level for a resistance roll is always the current resistance (max-damage). If a character has a wound in that resistance, that wound's penalty will also be applied to any resistance rolls.
Since this means that Resistance rolls become increasingly difficult the more damage that type has taken, heavily wounded characters rely on the help of their team members to recover their injuries.

Helping

Any time a character could reasonably help another with a check they’re performing, they can do so. If a player announces that their character assists another, the character making the check receives a +1 bonus to their check. This can be done retroactively if it makes sense narratively.
Regardless of how many people assist in a roll, the maximum bonus that can be received from help is +1, unless a trait or ability specifies otherwise.

Raising

Every character can decide to raise a roll at any point. Raising can be considered an Ability that every character has access to and is therefore listed on the character sheet as such.
After making a roll, a character can take one point of Fatigue damage, to reroll both dice. This can have one of four results:

If the initial roll was a success and the reroll is a success, you have scored a critical success. This will add an additional positive effect to your roll.
If the initial roll was a success and the reroll failed, the roll is just counted as a regular success.
If the initial roll failed and the reroll is a success, the roll is just counted as a regular success.
If both the initial roll and the reroll failed, the roll is counted as a critical failure and an additional negative effect will be added to the roll outcome.

What exactly these additional outcomes are depends on the circumstances and the goal of the roll. They might apply extra damage, make it so an action goes unnoticed or have an NPC spill more information than they would have otherwise.

Combat actions work in much the same way as any other action. There is no defined turn order but within one round, every player gets to go once, although they can perform more than one action in a turn.

At the start of a round, the GM announces what actions all NPCs in the encounter will perform this turn. The GM does not roll so if an NPC targets a PC with an attack, instead of the NPC rolling an attack skill, the PC can choose to either just take the hit or roll a Dodge action.

Once the GM has announced all NPC actions, the PCs can announce their actions in whichever order they want. A PC can take as many actions as they wish but depending on how many actions they take, they apply a multi-action modifier to all actions this round.
The standard assumption for actions in a round is 2 – one attack and one dodge. If a character performs 2 actions, they receive no multi-action bonus or penalty.
If a character performs only 1 action in a round, they receive a +1 focus bonus to that action.
For every action beyond the second, the character receives a cumulative -1 penalty to all actions that round (-1 at 3 actions, -2 at 4 actions…)
While helping does not require a roll, it still counts as an action when calculating the multi-action penalty for all actions that do require rolls.

All actions are rolled when the players announce their actions but only resolved at the end of the turn simultaneously. That means that characters can choose to help with actions that other players have already announced and rolled.
Example: The soldier fires his rifle at an enemy drone. The soldier’s success range is from 5-9. They roll a total result of 10, missing the success range by one. The engineer, seeing this result, decides to help with the soldier’s action by sending a confusing signal to the drone. With this help action, they add a +1 bonus to the soldier’s check, extending their success range by 1 to include 10. This has turned the roll into a success.
It also means that taking out an enemy does not prevent that enemy from attacking.
Example: An enemy security guard is firing at the soldier. The soldier is returning fire and decides not to dodge so they receive the focus bonus. The soldier’s shot hits its mark and kills the security guard. However, as all attacks are resolved simultaneously, the security guard fired their gun at the same time and, since the soldier decided not to dodge, hit the soldier who now has to make an armor check to resist the damage.

Attacking and Being Attacked

Attack and Dodge rolls function as any other skill check does. A successful attack does 1 point of damage that can be resisted by armor. The following two flowcharts outline how attack rolls are resolved.

If an attack roll against an unarmored character succeeds or a dodge roll by an unarmored character fails, that character takes 1 point of damage.
If that character is wearing armor, another roll is performed to see whether the armor blocks the damage or not. Depending on the weapon and armor, the armor might get damaged in the process or it might come out unharmed.While this might look confusing for now, it is actually fairly simple. Don't worry if you're unsure about how this works for now. I will help you all once we get to that point in the game :)

5+ does not use levels in the D&D sense. Character Improvement happens on an individual basis for each skill.
Broadly said, the more you use a skill, the faster it will level up.

Rolling Doubles

The main method for leveling up skills is by rolling doubles above your current level.
If during any skill check, both D6 show the same number and that number is above your current level in that skill, immediately raise that skill’s level by 1. If that skill is marked, remove any marks it has.

Using Trait Penalties

Every Trait that can provide a bonus can also provide a penalty. If the conditions for adding a penalty to your roll are met, you can apply it but you do not have to.
If you choose to apply the penalty, however, regardless of success or failure of your skill check, you may mark that skill (by putting an asterisk in front of it on your character sheet).
During a long rest (Interplanetary Travel), you may attempt to train in order to level up marked skills.

If a skill has 1 mark: Erase the mark and one additional mark from any skill on your list -> You may roll your skill once. If you roll doubles above your current level, increase the skill’s level by 1
If a skill has 2 marks: Erase both marks and one additional mark from any skill on your list -> You may roll your skill once. If you roll doubles equal to or above your current level, increase the skill’s level by 1
If a skill has 3 marks: Erase all three marks and two additional marks from any skill on your list -> You may roll your skill once. If you roll doubles, increase the skill’s level by 1

You may Raise a Training roll but you do not recover the Fatigue damage you take during the same long rest. If you roll a critical failure during training, you take another point of Fatigue damage which also does not recover during this rest.

There are two types of rests.

A short rest consists of one to two hours of relaxing activities.
- During a short rest, every character may make one Fatigue Roll. If successful, they recover 2 points of Fatigue, otherwise, they recover 1 point.
- If a character uses a short rest to actively treat their injuries, they may make one Mental or Physical roll. If successful, they recover 1 point of that respective damage type. If a character does not treat any of their own wounds, they may help another character or, instead of having that character roll their resistance, roll a medicine skill check instead.

A long rest consists of multiple days without stressful activity. In this adventure, a long rest will take place every time the characters travel from one planet to another.
- During a long rest, every character recovers all current Fatigue Damage. They may also make a Fatigue Roll. If successful, they recover any Fatigue wounds they may have.
- Characters are encouraged to use long rests to treat their injuries, both Mental and Physical. They may make a roll for each damage type. If successful, they can either recover all damage they currently have or recover one wound of that type. Characters can help each other with these rolls.
- Characters may also train skills during a long rest. See here for more information.