<a href="https://app.roll20.net/lfg/listing/216321/strain" rel="nofollow">https://app.roll20.net/lfg/listing/216321/strain</a> Strain is a survival horror game at its core. It is designed to challenge the players more than their characters, creating tension through its core mechanics. Players choose to roll a number of dice, giving them some control over their chance to succeed, but by rolling more dice, they risk gaining Stress. Players have to roll higher than their Stress scores to avoid disaster, and as Stress increases, disaster becomes more likely. When characters gain too much Stress, they begin suffering from Psychosis. Stress can be removed by resting, but that also carries a risk with it, as this game assumes the setting will have a constant threat of danger. In addition to Stress and Psychosis, players must deal with Doom. Doom is the fundamental health measurement of the characters, the percentage chance that a character will die in a life-or-death situation, and increases as the characters suffer from injuries and other conditions. Though it is more likely that characters will die when their Doom scores are high, it is still possible for a character to die with hardly any Doom, or sometimes even survive with plenty. Characters gain skills through play that will increase their chance of success on dice rolls, and players will have to be creative when using their skills, figuring out how the words that describe their characters can be used in different situations. As characters advance, players will also have to carefully choose advancement options to make their characters powerful enough to survive more dangerous threats, as by default, enemies increase in level after each game session. The core mechanics, when used frequently, are ideal for horror, though it is also possible to use Strain for gritty survival stories or dangerous dungeon crawls. Strain is designed to be a challenge in all aspects: choosing how to roll dice and manage Stress and Doom, being creative when applying descriptive words to skill tests, building characters that are powerful enough to survive, and dealing with the dangers presented in whatever dark world it is played in.
