The Dice

This section takes a closer look at the Narrative dice and their symbols. When the action starts up, just about anything can happen. Dice symbols provide a narrative framework for the action—did your character hit their foe with a clean shot, or force the opponent to scramble for cover instead of attacking in return? Once you understand these dice and symbols, you gain a better understanding of our game’s core mechanic.

This section also tells you how to assemble a dice pool and when to introduce extra dice based on the circumstances. Dice sets can be purchased separately, or players may use the Genesys Dice App to roll them electronically.

When your character makes a skill check in Genesys, the dice allow you and your GM to quickly determine a task’s success or failure, as well as its magnitude and narrative implications. To accomplish this, Genesys uses six types of dice. Each type fulfills a specific function and purpose. Each die face is either blank or features one or more symbols that represent various positive or negative effects.

A typical dice pool contains somewhere between five and eight dice. This pool size covers the majority of situations. Difficult, complex, or epic situations may include more dice, while mundane situations may include fewer dice. If the task facing your character is so easy that success is virtually guaranteed, you may not need to roll dice at all! In fact, we recommend that you limit generating and rolling a dice pool to the important tasks that can influence the story.

In Genesys, you can divide the types of dice into two categories. The first type features dice with symbols beneficial to accomplishing tasks. The second type features symbols that cancel those beneficial symbols and hinder the accomplishment of tasks.

Boost, Ability, and Proficiency dice are the beneficial, positive dice. Setback, Difficulty, and Challenge dice are the negative, disruptive dice.