Core Mechanic
Generally, play happens as a conversation between the players and the GM, with both parties adding description to the story and reacting to one another’s actions. When the GM thinks that it might be interesting if a character’s action fails, or if there’s something significant at stake, they can ask the player to roll to see if they succeed - and whether they lose something in the bargain.
To see if their action succeeds, the player rolls a D10 and consults the following table:
1: Critical Failure (take double stress)
> 2-5: Failure (take stress)
> 6-7: Success at a cost (take stress)
> 8-9: Success (take no stress)
> 10: Critical success (inflict +1 stress for each 10 you roll)
If the character has a relevant skill, they roll another D10.
If the character has a relevant domain, they roll another D10.
If the character has mastery over the action, skill or domain, they roll another D10. (Mastery doesn’t stack - you can only use it once per action, no matter how many sources you get it from. You don’t need a skill to benefit from mastery when using it, although often you’ll have both.)
The player selects the the highest dice result they rolled to resolve the action; the other dice don’t matter, unless they show 10 and they’re inflicting stress on someone else.
Don’t roll if there’s nothing at stake; if the character could do it, it works, and if they couldn’t, they don’t. Only roll if the character has something to lose.
Partial Stress
Sometimes you’re just rolling to avoid taking harm and not trying to achieve anything else in particular - you test to see if you can hang onto your mind after seeing something horrific, to avoid damage from someone taking a swing at you, or to escape from a burning building. On a 6-7 result on such an action, you still take stress, but it’s one dice type lower than usual. The same rules apply when you’re trying to buy something for cheap.
Difficulty
If an action is difficult, the GM subtracts dice from your pool equal to the difficulty. Difficulty ranges from 0 (standard) to 2 (very challenging). Surprise or ambush is a common reason to subtract dice; an NPC’s skill level is also represented by their difficulty, which applies to all rolls made against them.
No matter how high the difficulty of a task, if it’s at all possible, you’ll always roll at least 1 dice. For each point of difficulty that would take your dice pool below zero, the result is downgraded by one step on the core mechanic table above. For example: if a character with a dice pool of 1 attempts a difficulty 2 action, this would leave them with a dice pool of -1. They roll a single dice and treat it as though it scored the next-lowest result on the table; a roll of 10 would count as 8-9, a roll of 8-9 would count as 6-7, and so on.
Groups
For each character that assists you, if they have a relevant skill or domain, add 1 to your dice pool - but they take stress the same way you would. (There is a limit to how many characters can aid you on any given action, determined by the GM. For example, no more than two people can try to barge open a door without getting in each other’s way.)
For group skill actions (such as sneaking in somewhere), choose one player to lead the group. If they succeed, every other player rolls with mastery.
Stress
Stress is one of the most important parts of the Resistance system. As characters perform actions in the story, they’ll allot stress to their resistances; the more stress they have, the more likely it becomes that it will coalesce into Fallout - concrete ramifications of misfortune. Marking, enduring, clearing, and refreshing stress, as well as having it turn into Fallout, forms the core mechanical loop of a Resistance game.
Resistances
Every player character has a number of resistances which represent what they have to lose. The most immediate one to come to mind in RPG terms is health - often characters are caught up in danger and violence, and their physical well-being can be measured in terms of Hit Points, Wound Levels, or some other method of tracking damage.
To represent physical damage in the Resistance system, you could give a character the HEALTH resistance. As they mark stress to this resistance - when they’re hurt, exhausted, infected with a disease or malnourished - the odds of them taking Fallout increase. Fallout associated with the HEALTH resistance might be BROKEN BONE, or OUT OF BREATH, or VOMIT. (But: more on Fallout later.)
In the Resistance system, all misfortune that a character suffers works in the same way as the example above. Rather than tracking money, you can give characters a RESOURCES resistance and mark stress to it when they spend more than they can afford. Rather than trying to simulate or estimate the actions of their adversaries, you can give them a SAFETY resistance and mark stress to it when they put themselves in danger.
Example Resistance Lists
Fantastical Crusades
BODY: Physical damage, exhaustion.
FAITH: Doubt, heresy, inaction, loss of standing in the church.
GOLD: Loss of resources, supply lines or contacts.
SOUL: Spiritual damage, demonic corruption, madness, sickness.
Post-Apocalyptic
BODY: Pain, wounds, exhaustion, sickness.
BULLETS: Mark stress to Bullets when you fire a weapon, but also when you attempt to buy something, as bullets are the new currency.
FUEL: Mark stress to Fuel when you use a vehicle or power a generator.
HOPE: Madness, depression, despair, rage.
REP: Loss of respect and standing.
Office Politics
MANAGEMENT: Mark stress when you upset the higher-ups, fail to perform adequately, or bring the company into disrepute. Fallout includes: additional workload, demotion, termination.
COLLEAGUES: Mark stress when you upset your peers. Fallout includes: refusal to help on tasks, vendettas, loss of standing.
HOME: Mark stress when you neglect your out-of-work life. Fallout includes: loss of support network, break-ups, ill health.
Additional Resistance Slots
To represent that some characters are more able to handle misfortune, they can be given additional resistance slots. (How exactly they receive these is handled in the “Character” section later on.) When a character has one or more additional slots in a resistance, they mark stress to these slots first. Then, when the GM rolls to see if they trigger fallout, these additional slots do not count towards their total.
How Much Stress To Inflict, And To Which Resistance
Situations inflict stress on players relative to the risk and danger involved; this is determined by the GM. Breaking into a low-rent slum will cause D3 stress on a failure; it’s D6 to infiltrate a gang stronghold; and it’s D8 if you’re sneaking into somewhere really important, like a military base. If a player is fighting someone (or running away from them) and they take stress, they’ll usually take stress equal to the amount that their enemy’s weapon inflicts, if the enemy’s within range.
Hopefully it should be clear from the fiction what resistance stress should be marked to. If it isn’t immediately clear, the GM and player should discuss the situation to see what makes sense - and, if they can’t come to a conclusion, maybe there isn’t a need to roll or inflict stress at all.
Stress And Npcs
NPCs don’t have multiple resistances or roll for fallout. Instead, they have one - called Resistance - and when they receive stress equal to their score in it, they’re at the mercy of the player characters.
Removing Stress
You can remove stress from your character in one of three ways:
You can lay low to remove all stress suffered, but the plot will move ahead without you, and things will occur that are outside of your control.
You can act to remove stress in a particular category by narratively spending time doing something that would remove stress (i.e. borrowing money from a friend to lower RESOURCES stress, visiting a doctor to lower HEALTH stress etc). Remove D3, D6 or D8 stress depending on the lengths you go to in order to recover.
You can refresh (see the Character section) by acting in accordance with your character’s refresh action(s). When you refresh, remove D3, D6 or D8 stress depending on how fully, and how dramatically, you fulfilled the requirements of your refresh action.
Also, suffering fallout reduces the amount of stress your character carries - it shifts from abstract to definite. When you suffer minor fallout, remove 3 stress; when you suffer moderate fallout, remove 5; when you suffer severe fallout, remove 7.
Fallout
Each time a player character takes stress, the GM checks for fallout - to see if there’s any kind of ongoing, serious effect at play. The GM rolls a D10 and compares it to the current total stress marked against the character’s resistances - if result of the D10 roll is lower, the character suffers fallout. The level of fallout depends on the amount of total stress the character had when the fallout triggered:
2-4 Stress: Minor Fallout
5-8 Stress: Moderate Fallout
9+ Stress: Severe Fallout
Work out what happens based on the type of stress that triggered the fallout; usually that’s the resistance type that has the most stress marked against it. If there’s a mix, or it’s not clear, go with whatever sounds more interesting.
Remember: On minor fallout, remove 3 stress; on moderate fallout, remove 5; on severe fallout, remove 7.
If you’d like, you can allocate two fallout results from the category before the one selected instead. (So: instead of being KNOCKED OUT, you can be BLEEDING and PANICKED.) You can also upgrade fallout from one stage to the next if a character suffers fallout from repeat sources. (So: if a character who’s already BLEEDING suffers further minor fallout during the same fight, you can get rid of that BLEEDING and give them a moderate result instead, like BROKEN LIMB.)
Characters can mitigate fallout with an appropriate action; minor fallout can be removed instantly, but anything moderate or above can only be stabilised and managed without long-term care. Abilities that let you clear stress can be used to remove fallout instead, at the GM’s discretion: 3 stress to repair minor fallout, 5 stress to repair moderate or fallout, and 7 stress to repair severe fallout. (But severe fallout generally isn’t the sort of thing that you “cure.”)