[RPG] Film noir character archetypes

Working with a d4 Wild Die will have a number of effects on the system. Note that I haven't yet run the numbers on the exact changes to probabilities with this change, but I believe that the general trends I've identified will hold:

• You will reduce the average die total on trait rolls, but the results you get will be more 'swingy', as 25% of the time you will get a 1 on the d4, and 25% you will get a raise. This may make the system feel a little more arbitrary and luck based as on average, results for PCs will be less consistent. It will also increase the frequency of critical fails, and depending on the setting this could have a major impact on the dangerousness of characters with Arcane Backgrounds and the unpredictability of Skills with bad outcomes when these are rolled.
• It becomes more important to spend advances on raising skills and attributes in order to compensate for the lower Wild Die. This is likely to lead to fewer Edges being taken by your players. As Edges are more important than skills for defining the 'niches' that each PC fills, you may well end up with PCs that are more similar in terms of what they are good at.
• Average damage rolls will be lower as there will be fewer Raises on successful attacks. This will impact on the value of Edges relating to Damage such as No Mercy.

Regarding other suggestions to achieve what you are trying to do:

• Removal of the Wild Die altogether is a huge change, and will have a massive impact on all sorts of areas of the game. Even if you only consider doing this for certain rolls, I would be very careful, as it is likely to have consequences on other areas of the system that will be difficult to correct for.
• Most suggestions around this raise NPC abilities rather than lower those of the PCs, as this is a far easier angle of attack with tried and tested methods. For example, you can introduce more gradual 'levels' between Extras and Wild Cards including Extras with 3 wounds, Wild Cards with no Wounds, Extras who only use a Wild Die in their 'expert' skills, varying the number of bennies available to different NPCs.
• If you want to make PCs more 'squishy', then an obvious area to look at is the way wounds and injuries work. Gritty Damage and Critical Fails are both setting rules that could be used to help reinforce this feel, as well as being frugal with the number of Bennies you reward during each session.

If there is key information the PCs simply must find in order to advance the story, then you have to ensure that they find it one way or another. Following on from this idea, a fail on a skill roll doesn't necessarily have to indicate that you do not find anything. Instead it could mean a complication such as:

• It takes longer than you thought it would
• You are clumsy in your attempt and someone who you'd rather not know finds out about what you're doing. If what you were doing is illegal, then maybe the police are on your tail etc.
• The information is incomplete
• The information is partially incorrect
• You get roughed up a bit
• It costs more money in bribes
• etc, etc

The key principle here is that you only make them roll when failure is interesting, and the above list gives a few ideas as to what 'interesting' might mean. If failure is not interesting then you should not make them roll at all.

On a side note, Deadlands Noir introduces some interesting mechanics for investigation focused stories, including tailing, patter, interrogation, beating the streets and hitting the books. The cost of failure is built into the mechanic for each of these, and they all tie into existing Savage Worlds skills.