Bayonetta TTRPG

How would you handle a Bayonetta style game as a TTRPG?

Is there a specific existing system you'd use, or how would you homebrew it?

It would need to be the most fast pace shit you could possibly do in a table top game, while also giving the sense that you're doing a ridiculous amount of damage with everything you do.

I'd almost stick with D6s, just get a fuckload of them, and have it so every move is basically putting a small handful of those dice in a cup and rolling them out Yahtzee style. Quick and simple to add up but with a good feeling every time you do an action.

long hair bayo > short hair bayo
this is the objective truth

This brings up a mechanic that someone thought up for a DMC-inspired (IIRC) game.

Fizzling dice, where instead of exploding on high numbers, dice explode automatically unless you roll low on it. Basically exploding dice on 3-6 or 2-6 depending on stuff.

It kind of reflects the combo-making nature in 3D-beat'em'ups.

I like that idea, I didn't even consider the idea of combos.

I saw a different DMC inspiration which was based on rummy; making straights for long combos and pairs for devastating hits.

With multiple players you can combine for even longer combos.

So you'll roll and roll and roll and roll and roll and...

You'd neet to completely break conventions. The tried and true turn and interaction structure just doesn't work if you want to emulate shit like this, unless it's some quasi freeform where everyone gets to narrate for five minutes.
Maybe some simultaneous turn mechanic with cards where actions are tied to suits and simultaneous reveals would work. Anything that's quick and keeps the flow going, no mechanics that take even longer than 20 seconds to figure out every time they come up.

>unless it's some quasi freeform where everyone gets to narrate for five minutes.

... Feng Shui or Wushu?

You lucky I thought about this the other day, homes.

Exalted, which already has powers listed as being "Perfect" and the combat is measured in 'ticks' rather than just rounds. As in, how much your character can do in seconds, with bonus dice awarded for stunts, AKA really over-the-top descriptions of what your character is doing with her Firearms and Athletics/Dodge skill.

Mostly, this idea came about because I remembered a cutscene from Devil May Cry 4, when Dante aimed his bullets so perfectly that each shot hit the back of the back of the previous bullet like billiard/pool balls.

If it involves awesome stuff that makes you shout, "Oh bullshit!" then it's Exalted, and Bayonetta/Devil May Cry (classic version) qualifies.

Now that I think about it, Bayonetta might count as an Infernal...

Probably better to rate the hits by simply the amount of dice.

The idea is that your attack action would be solved there and then, probably with weapons that do fixed damage * the amount of dice that succeed.

So you start with 3 dice, and let's say that your weapon does 4 damage:

4 - 5 - 5 = 12
1 - 4 - 6 = 8
5 - 2 = 4
1 = 0
= 24 damage

Of course, different weapons could have different finishers or special attacks that can be activated on certain places in a combo or depending on other factors.

Unless someone got on an extremely lucky streak (and if weapons have a hit limit per turn based on, say, weight, so heavy weapons can only do up to 3 attacks where faster weapons can do up to 5 or 6), the amount of rolling would actually be somewhat equal to a turn in D&D, so it's not that bad.

Bump

I'd say exalted, but that's really crunchy so it may not have the fast paced feel. Maybe something cinamatic and narrative based like Fate.

A while back someone attemptes to make a card game using CAAAHHHRAAAAZZZZYYYYY combat like bayonetta dmc and god hand all had. I have no idea what became of it but it seemed really cool. Basically you had a character card. And its deck of tricks. And it all revolved around cards moving in and out of space zones and using there decks to deal hp damage to the other opponent. If i remember Dante was best used as a mid to far range combo deck. Vergil was all about drawing characters into close range and keeping them there and shitclikecthat. The dude even made pdf cards for the characters.

Here's my rpg for high action, high speed, high style combat with high impact supers.

4 stats:

Style
Speed
Action
Super

Each stat (except Super it starts at 0) starts at 3. You have 3 upgrades. 1 upgrade can get you:

+2 to one of Style, Speed, or Action
+1 to all three Style, Speed, and Action
+1 to Super

Next you have to name your stats. Style should describe your characters stylish moves. Speed should describe your characters motion and agility. Action should describe their strength and might.

Super should describe their super attack finisher.

HP is equal to the sum of your starting stats times 2.

Rolls: when you make a roll, you roll a number of d6's equal to the relevant stat.

Special most important rule: in combat when you roll a stat, that stat ticks down by 1 and Special ticks up by 1.

Combat doesn't use initiative. Players mark their target and action on an index card and reveals what they do.

Attack actions:

Action Attack: you deal 2 damage to your target per success.
Speed attack: You deal 1 damage to your target per success, and negate 1 damage you take this round per success you roll.
Style Attack: you deal 1 damage to your target per success. In addition, you may move 1 point to your super per success rolled from any stat.
Super Attack: You deal 3 Damage to your target per success rolled. Then reset your stat pools.

Defense Actions

Action Defense: negate 1 damage you take this round per success you roll, and if your target attacks you, deal 1 damage to them per success you roll.
Speed Defense: negate 1 Damage you take this turn per success you roll. If your target attacks you this round, negate an additional 1 damage per success you roll
Style Defense: Negate 1 damage you take this round per success you roll. If your target attacks you this round, you move 1 point from any stat to Super per success you roll.
Super defense: Negate 2 damage you take this round per success you roll

That's the base system and combat for now. More to come.

no doubt brother

Oh, Super Defense resets stats like Super attack does.

The goal of the fluctuating stats is to emulate the encouraged playstyle Cuhrazy games have where your score is influenced by switching up your attacks in combos.

The dicepool system is so players can set up their stats into four pools with their dice in those pools, and then can physically move dice from one pool to another.

On the to do list: talent customization, unique commands like area attacks or the like, midcombat Posing rules and alternate Super rules to have it where you pick different types of Supers like Super Mode, different types of attacks, and maybe even healing.

Also GM-side rules like Minions and Bosses.

Also posting the original base system that was designed for Karate Bug Man.

Roll a stat, stat ticks down by 1, Special ticks up by 1...
Except you either forgot to include what Special is, or did you mean the Super stat?

The second, I meant Super. Thank you for catching that.

Feng Shui would work quite well. You're just pinning a different scale of fantastical to your abilities, which is an intended wrinkle of the system. By default descriptions tie things to somewhere between classic Hong Kong martial arts and John Wick-tier gun-fu grit. Kick the narrative end of what you're doing up to 11 and you're Bayonetta-ing it up like nobody's business.

I had an idea for this in a super old thread way back with the same premise. The idea was combining the aforementioned fuckload of dice as a modular dice pool that you spend on actions. Want to attack? How many dice are you going to wager on that? Want to defend? Better have some dice left over from that attack so that you can get out of the way in time.

Basically an idea of a dice economy with your actions, where you have to gauge whether you can take down the problem before it can hurt you, or if you have to stick to short combos to survive.

No problem.

I would say to cut down on bookkeeping, instead of ticking stats down, the system a few posts back of 'combo rolls' might work better, where each success explodes, until you run out of rolls.
Combine that with each success being an action, and the initial pool rolled being determined by a stated intent prior to the roll, Ala the wushu rpg, could work.

The base idea for bookkeeping is to keep your dice in your stat, so if you have Action 4 (one man army). You keep 4 dice in your Action pool. You roll an Action attack, then transfer 1 Action die to your Super Pool.

Also biggest fucking mistake I made: Successes on your dice are 4+. I can't believe I missed that.

And to touch on the actual issue of exploding dice, exploding dice over-encourages larger dice-pools, and one of the things I want this system to do is to have characters attempting multiple different strategies in a fight rather than just using their biggest pool over and over again, and I'd rather it be by creating a "sameness" penalty (which ties into the mechanic for super attacks) than to have a power frequency mechanic.

You roll extra dice based on how much your character makes you want to buttfuck them by walking.

If the dice pool range we're talking about is 3-11 dice, 11 is a bucket load of dice as is. Adding in exploding dice, considering that you're shrinking that pool every time it's used, plus having a pool repetition penalty would work.

Just like the games, have using the same pool twice in a row, flush out the Super count or what have you (basically Style from the games).

You then have certain enemies require certain Super amounts, or Style levels in order to defeat them. Or Super successes. If using your largest pool repeatedly keeps your Super level at 0, such an enemy would end up being invulnerable, and probably would make short work of a player not varying their attacks.

The reason I like exploding dice for this, is it gives more of a fast paced action feel and flow, where you may have intended to shoot twice, now gets an extra two shots in from a good roll type of thing.

If thinking of things from that combo perspective, keeping it going, getting the Super pool up, taunting or posing could be used almost as what you listed for style, a way to keep a combo going, add variety to the action mix, and debuff opponents.
Characters could pick a signature taunt or pose, and each might do a different thing, like reduce an opponent's action pool, Defense, damage output, disarm, etc.

In the Karate Bug Man Kick version, there was actually a rule about your Kick attack dealing KO damage while other attacks deal Scratch damage. Only KO can take out a major foe, but scratch gets added to the KO damage.

Anyway, I just don't like exploding dice. They're.... Uh... I don't like it.