Game Rules

There's only one change to the core rules you really need to know about My Little Pony: Savage Adventures, and that's this:

Tricks and Tests of Wills

now cause the Shaken condition on a simple success on the opposed roll,

and a "mental Wound" on a Raise on the opposed roll.

That's it! That's all! Go forth and play now!

Okay, a few more details if you must.

Start with the Core Rules

Just like, to remind you. If that's okay. eep

Remember that we're starting with a clean slate: MLP:SA begins with the core Savage Worlds rules and forgets any other module, supplement, DnD conversion or whathaveyou.

If you want, you can add them back on later, but MLP:SA chooses to let the core Savage Worlds rules do all the heavy lifting. This leaves you free to do things on the fly!

If you're a cheap-ass (not judging, I am too) and don't have the Core Rules, you can use the official free Test Drive Rules provided by Pinnacle as a substitute, but be forewarned that you'll miss out on a lot of nuances without the full rules.

Non-Lethal Damage

All attacks in MLP:SA are considered to default to non-lethal damage unless stated otherwise. Come on, this is pony, dude.

In other words, if you are using a edged weapon, you automatically have a -1 to all Fighting rolls for that weapon to cause non-lethal damage (as you must now use the flat of the blade) unless you state your intention is to cause lethal damage, in which case there is no penalty, but now ponies are sad ): (Use that lethal sword for intimidation, not actually whacking off heads.)

As all damage is considered non-lethal by default, opponents that are Incapacitated are "knocked out" for 1d6 hours and not dead. just like pokemon

Default "weapons" for non-lethal damage are your bare hooves, your bare hooves + horseshoes, blunt weapons, and foodstuffs. ph34r teh apple pie

If your weapon is intended to poke or slash things, or in any way draw blood, it's a lethal weapon.

This is to discourage blatant use of weaponry in MLP:SA, and to encourage more hoofdicuffs and less "and now I attack with my sword." In addition, due to reduction in weaponry-use, the damage-output of the Fighting skill is curtailed, leading to an increased use and tag-team use of what should be the initial and perhaps even primary form of combat in MLP:SA - Tricks and Test of Wills.

Tricks and Test of Wills

As stated earlier, Tricks and Tests of Wills now cause the Shaken condition on a simple success on the opposed roll, and a "mental Wound" on a Raise on the opposed roll.

"Mental Wound" is treated exactly like a regular Wound in Savage Worlds, except they're "healed" by the Leadership skill instead of the Healing skill. In all other aspects they are treated the same (including using Vigor for Soak rolls, Incapacitation save rolls, and Natural Healing rolls). Consider it to be mental "fatigue" or confusion, or a blow to a foe's pride.

What are Tricks and Test of Wills?

  • Tricks, as the word implies, are stunts and maneuvers to put a foe at some sort of disadvantage - sand in their eye, drop a rug over them, "look behind you!", playing dead, kick a spray of mud. To distract, confuse, disconcert, or observe your opponent, making it easier for you and your friends to hit the opponent.
  • Test of Wills mess with an opponent's mental state - make 'em flinch (Intimidate), mock their hair (Taunt), cow them into submission (Intimidate), egg them on to make them lose their guard (Taunt)...making it easier for you to take advantage of them next time!

Note that if you want to persuade an opponent to "play nice" via the Persuasion skill, that'll require the Silver Tongue edge. You can also use your performance/art skills (singing, poetry, music) as a Test of Wills in select situations via the Entertainer edge.

To sum up mechanically:

    • Tricks
      • Basic success on opposed roll: Target has -2 Parry until their next action and is Shaken
      • Raise on opposed roll: Target has -2 Parry until their next action and has a "mental Wound"
      • Multiple Tricks on a foe don't inflict more penalties to Parry, but can lead to more "mental Wounds"
    • Test of Wills
      • Basic success on opposed roll: Attacker has +2 to their next action against the Target, and Target is Shaken
      • Raise on opposed roll: Attacker has +2 to their next action against the Target, and Target has a "mental Wound"

This makes Tricks and Tests of Wills far more effective in combat. In addition, Tricks and Tests of Wills are already used in core Savage Worlds to aid other characters and as a combat tactic; now in MLP:SA Tricks and Tests of Wills are even more potent. Tag-teaming has never been so..."lethal." ;D

Design Note: As listed in the Savage Worlds Combat Guide, Tricks are useful for the entire team, and Test of Wills have a rolling effect that can also benefit the entire team. In MLP:SA, it's expected that Tricks and Test of Wills are the first plan of action in combat, followed up by any Fighting hitters - it's a team-based effort! Tricks and Test of Wills are now also more effective for characters that use more non-violent approaches, especially with edges such as Moxie, Hulk Smash, and Acrobat.

If you look at the dice probabilities (and more under Game Aids), you'll see that in general you have a better chance of success of defeating Wildcards with Fighting and Extras with Tricks/Test of Wills. However, by default you can do multiple Fighting attacks; Tricks/Test of Wills requires edges for that. There's pros and cons to each approach!

Withdrawing From Close Combat

Due to now Tricks and Tests of Wills becoming more "lethal" in MLP:SA, withdrawing from close combat now requires a slightly different definition:

Whenever a character withdraws from Doing Stuff To An Opponent, all adjacent non-Shaken opponents get a free immediate Fighting attack (but only one).

This means if you draw in close to perform an Agility or Smarts trick or get in their face to pull a Taunt or Intimidate Test of Wills (since if you get in their face with your big-ass sword, you can get a Intimidate bonus ;D), then attempt to withdraw, the opponent gets a free attack on you. If all you did was run past them, a free fighting attack is not triggered (unless the opponent has the First Strike edge).

Off-Hand (Off-Hoof) Penalty

In core Savage Worlds, characters have a -2 penalty whenever they're doing things that require precise hand-eye coordination with their non-dominant hand (like Fighting/Shooting).

However, we're playing ponies, so due to having four hooves -- plus the fact that ponies also use their mouths and tails a lot to manipulate objects -- attempting to apply a off-hoof penalty for anything other than the right front hoof is downright silly.

Therefore the Off-Hand / Off-Hoof penalty more or less doesn't exist in MLP:SA.

The GM may decide it applies in select situations such as attempting to use a pony's mouth/tail for an action or when a pony is tied up somehow, but for the most part in MLP:SA ponies effectively have the Ambidextrous Edge for free.

Multiple Actions

In core Savage Worlds, characters cannot make more than one Fighting/Shooting attack with the same weapon in one hand in one round (unless you have the Frenzy edges). Aka if a character has a weapon in each hand, they can do two Fighting/Shooting attacks (with penalties for the multi-action as well as being their off-hand), or just one Fighting/Shooting attack with one weapon, with no multi-action / off-hand penalty.

But again, due to ponies having four legs, a mouth, and a tail, multiple actions in MLP:SA works a little bit differently:

    1. Remember, there is no off-hand / off-hoof penalty
    • I'm pretty sure a difference in hoof preference doesn't matter as much because getting bucked in the face usually means two hooves at a time.
  1. As default, you can make two Fighting/Shooting attacks per round, at the standard multi-action penalty of -2
    • In general, the front hooves count as "one limb" and the back hooves count as "another limb," effectively acting like left/right hands on humans in core Savage Worlds
    • Although if you want to describe it as a buck with the front hooves and a tail whip lash, that's cool too. It's still effectively two Fighting attacks
  2. As default, you can't make more than two Fighting/Shooting attacks per round, even though you have four hooves. You need Edges for that:
    • Sweep / Improved Sweep, Two-Fisted ("Rodeo Bucking"), Frenzy / Improved Frenzy edges, and possibly First-Strike / Improved First Strike, Counterattack / Improved Counterattack, along with the edges that combine Tricks/Test of Wills with Fighting
    • To clarify: it's basically two actions to attack per round - not 2 Fighting, and 2 Shooting

Unarmed Defender

Because we're dealing with ponies, the Unarmed Defender rule also needs to be technically tweaked. Strictly speaking, in core Savage Worlds all animals and monsters are considered armed due to natural weapons such as claws and teeth.

In MLP:SA, we're all ponies/animals anyway...so the Unarmed Defender rule just doesn't exist.

You get no bonus to Fighting rolls if you're waving a weapon around and your opponent doesn't. Because they probably have hooves and they can still trample you to bits. Now, Intimidate bonus, on the other hoof...

Cooperative Rolls

As this is a game based on the MLP:Friendship is Magic show, it'd make sense to help your buddies out in the game too, right?

Cooperative Rolls are already part of the Core Savage Worlds rules (Game Rules > Trait Tests > Cooperative Rules), and they're built-in with the Gang-Up bonus concept, but for MLP:SA I'd also like to explicitly say you can also make Cooperative Trick/Test of Will rolls too. This requires one or more characters to be on Hold in order to act at the same time as another character (which therefore runs the risk of interruption, unless you have the Tag-Team edge).