Playing Detailed and Point-Buy RPGs Solo: Crunchy Rules Without a GM

Detailed games, with point-built characters, long skill lists and precise rules for almost everything, are often thought of as too heavy for solo play. In practice they suit it well: the rules answer "can I do this?", and an oracle answers "what is out there?". Here is how to make a crunchy system run smoothly when you are both player and GM, with one well-known generic system as the main example.

Why detailed rules work alone

In a light game, the oracle has to answer almost everything. In a detailed game, the rules already tell you how far you can jump, how hard the lock is and what a sword does to a lightly armoured guard. That leaves the oracle only the questions the rules cannot answer: is there a guard at all, does the merchant believe you, what is behind the door. Many solo players find this split comfortable, because the dice that matter most are the rules' dice, and they are not secretly deciding anything themselves.

GURPS®, the generic point-buy system from Steve Jackson Games, is a good example. Characters are built from a point budget, almost every action is a roll against a skill, and the same core works in any genre, so one character sheet can follow you from a fantasy dungeon to a haunted subway.

Keep a crunchy game fast

• Choose your options before you play. Detailed systems offer many optional rules. Pick the few you enjoy and write them on one page in your own words. Leave the rest on the shelf until a session really needs them.
• Look up once, then decide. When a rule is unclear, spend a minute looking, then make a ruling and write it down. Next time you will be consistent, and your notebook becomes your house rules.
• Use skill defaults and broad skills for minor characters. Only your hero needs a full sheet. For everyone else, one or two numbers that matter in the scene are enough.
• Save detail for the moments that matter. Travel, shopping and small talk can be one roll or one oracle question. Spend the full rules on the fight, the climb and the heist.

Know your odds before you roll

Many detailed games, GURPS® among them, ask you to roll under a number: three six-sided dice against your skill, for example, where lower is better. Knowing your real chance helps you make the kind of decisions your character would. The dice roller has a target setting under More options: choose Roll at or under, set the number, and every roll tells you whether it succeeded, by how much, and the exact chance it had. Three dice against 12 succeed about 74% of the time; against 10, exactly half.

The margin is useful in solo play. A roll that succeeds by a lot is a good moment to add a bonus detail; a near miss can become a success at a cost. If your rules already say what margins mean, use them; if not, treat a big margin like the oracle's "Yes, and...".

Let the oracle do the GM's other job

The rules decide what your character can do. The oracle decides what the world does. Ask yes/no questions about anything the rules and the scenario leave open, and set the likelihood from what you know: a guarded vault is Likely to have a guard; a quiet road is Unlikely to have an ambush. Use the random events and NPC generators when something new needs to appear.

Fights in detail

Detailed combat is satisfying solo if you keep track of it. Put the fight in the Turn Tracker so turn order, rounds and timed conditions are never forgotten, and let the enemy tactics roller decide what each foe tries, so you cannot steer them into your own plan. Paper minis from the Print Sheet and a battlemap help with facing and reach. See playing solo with miniatures.

Ready-made solo adventures

If you want a story already laid out, look for adventures written for one player. Free solo adventures for GURPS® have been published by fans; one well-known source is 1shotadventures.com, whose solos include a cold-weather fantasy adventure and a 1920s horror one. Adventures written for other games can be converted on the fly: keep the story and the places, and use your own system's numbers. The free, fan-made GURPS® Character Sheet program helps you build and track a character.

You can also start with one of our own example adventures: they are system-neutral, so the scenes work with any rules you bring.

A campaign of your own

Point-buy games make it easy to grow a character slowly over many sessions. Keep the sheet and a short log in the Campaign Notebook, build the setting a little at a time with the World Builder, and let each session end with a question for the next one. The rules keep the character consistent; the oracle and the generators keep the world surprising.