Estoc: Diceless Heroic Roleplaying
The rules of Estoc are as such:
Each character has four Qualities. A Quality can be anything – a title, a piece of equipment, a skill, a career, a conviction, a supernatural power.
Characters succeed at anything possible and fail at anything impossible, except when they encounter a Peril.
A character must call on a Quality to solve a Peril. Once a Quality is called on, it cannot be called on again in that adventure. A solved Peril is solved for all characters.
Other characters can use a Quality to assist in solving a Peril. Qualities can be used to assist any number of times. A character can only assist with one Quality per Peril.
A serious Peril can be solved without any assistance. A grave Peril requires the assistance of one other character. A dreadful Peril requires two assistance. Yet greater Perils may require even more assistance, though if the heroes are few, may simply become impossible tasks.
The challenge of a Peril may be evident or secret. Only one character can call on a Quality to solve a Peril at a time. Any number of attempts can be made to solve a Peril, but a Quality once called on cannot be called on again in the same adventure.
At any time, a character may sacrifice a Quality. The Quality is gone, never again to be called on or used to assist. Sacrificing counts as calling on a Quality to solve a Peril with three assistance.
A character who has sacrificed all their Qualities is vanquished. Their tale has ended.
At the end of each adventure, any character who has sacrificed Qualities gains as many new Qualities. They are not the same as the sacrificed ones.
Estoc: Diceless Heroic Roleplaying © Lyme 2025 Lyme is openly licensed under CC BY 4.0. This means you are free to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, including commercial, so long as attribution is given to the creator.
Estoc may appear again as part of a longer work. Or perhaps it will not.