RPGaDAY2025 Day 20: Enter

On Day 20 of the RPGaDAY 2025 Challenge our topic is “enter”. What do you usually do when you are entering a location? Well, most of the time you are entering through a door. This is the angle I wanted to blog from because getting past a door has been one of the examples that I’ve used to explain a roleplaying game system to new players. Especially for a simple one-shot game like those played at SaltCON or at my local gaming store.

One of the games that I’ve GMed quite a few times for these one-shots is Star Trek Adventures 2nd Edition. When explaining the rules, the first thing that I say is that this game is an episode simulator, not a tactical simulator. Then the second thing explain is how the 2d20 system works. After talking about the attributes and the departments developing your target number based on your action, I bring up the challenge. The characters trying to get past the door that is between them and their objective. Perhaps they are being pursued by an enemy, or someone on the other side of the door is critically injured, etc. In STA2e, your character sheet doesn’t define what steps you can or can’t take, the player does. You see the door in front of you, it has these traits (reinforced, computerized, looks frail, strong lock, etc.) what do you do? One character may try to break down the door. In that case as the GM, I’d tell them what attribute and department to use for your target number and how many successes that need to be rolled. If the door was reinforced, the target number would be higher, if it was already damaged, it could be lower. Another character may try to pick the lock, check out the computer controls for the door (if present), try to communicate through the door to guide someone through the process of unlocking the door, etc. Again, I like the ability for the player to decide instead of the character sheet. At the last SaltCON a father and son team heard this explanation, was quickly able to get into their first STA2e game and enjoyed themselves. Even the son was asking if they could pick up the core rulebook after the one-shot. I was quite proud when I heard that.

Are there other games that have similar concepts of allowing the players to get past the door in any method of their choosing? While I’m certain that most experienced players can come up with ideas of their own, I’m looking for systems that actively encourage this thinking. While I haven’t played it yet, I’m eager to try the Siege system used for Castles and Crusades. It’s a D20 system, but the character has two (or three) primary ability scores that when used in a skill test, has a lower base target number to reach. A character can try to use a skill that would fit a non-primary ability, but the base target number would be higher. Then that target number is adjusted based upon the traits of the scene (like a door being reinforced instead of barely holding on its hinges).

I know I’ve seen other games like this, but in the short amount of time that I have to write this blog post, I can’t do a deep dive into them all. But like that father and son team, I hope that it gives players a chance to enter into a system that they really like.

Feedback from LelxTenebris on Mastodon: @TardisCaptain Did you know that Gallant Knight Games is putting together a new edition of the D6 System? The Kickstarter definitely funded, and if you take a look at it, there is guaranteed to be a module which is essentially Star Wars with the serial numbers filed off. My suspicion is that this is going to probably be the best choice for classic WEG-style Star Wars play, if that’s the kind of mechanics that you want to go for. I was not down for the Fantasy Flight version, specifically for the custom dice, which I thought was way too fiddly and ignores the fact that pretty much everyone already has some dice. At this point, if I wanted to play a Star Wars game, I would probably either break out Scum and Villainy if I was interested in playing/GMing for a group, or just Starforged and go with the narrative framework.

Are there other RPG systems that you could explain using the door example? Do you like the idea of the players trying to enter past a door as a way to explain the system to them? Tell me about it. This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com with any comments.