My game Isotope, does not have character classes, however, your choice of stat line act as a de facto character class in a bunch of ways. It determines what you’re good at, what equipment you start with, what perks you can choose, and what mutations you do or do not have, not to mention the animal heritage that Wildlings get.
This is a draft version of the section of the Isotope rules that will delve into what the stats mean.
Free Isotope is my post-apocalyptic mutant weirdness TTRPG, and you can get it for free on Drive Thru RPG.
Stats in Isotope
Humans used to rule the world, but they don’t anymore. Now it’s human, mutant, or wildling, and Humans don’t rule much beyond a few stable villages on the edge of pure mutant weirdness.
In most role-playing games with stats, the stats have names that are clear and intuitive—like Strength, Cunning, or Medicine. Isotope’s characteristics aren’t like that. They’re named after things that are peculiar to this imagined world, a world that you’re not familiar with, at least at the beginning. Learning the characteristics is part of learning the world. It’s part of what this game is about. This information is on the character sheets too, so the other players should help figure out which characteristic to use for each roll.
Each characteristic in Isotope covers a specific realm, and when you take an action that falls into that realm, you roll using that characteristic.
Human
Human memory goes back furthest, through the Golden Age of technology that was the human apogee, and, through their genetic heritage, back before to the dawn of life. Humans have an intuitive grasp of the ancient technologies, environments, and social norms that humans created.
Roll +Human when you:
Channel human nature and memory
Resist mutation and genome shift
Call upon memory, history, or ancient lore
Consort with humans and artificial intelligences
Deceive mutants or wildlings
Use and configure urtech
Survive and navigate in buildings and human-built environments
Pretend to be a human
Fight using urtech weapons
Mutant
There is a saying, “Humans look back, mutants walk forward.” Mutants are far too varied to characterize simply, but broadly speaking they are survivors. This is a dangerous, strange, and changeable world, and mutants will always adapt to meet its challenges, sometimes before your very eyes.
Roll +Mutant when you:
Reject human ways, forge new ways
Manifest and use weird mutations
Call upon cunning, observation, and sharp wits
Consort with mutants
Deceive non-mutants
Resist radiation
Build and repair midtech
Survive in wastelands, ruins, and weird environments
Fight using midtech weapons
Wildlings
The epochs of chaos changed the people, the land, the skies and, some say, the very laws of nature. Out of this change came the wildlings. What took humans millions of years to achieve—speech, tools, sentience, and grasping hands, the wildlings achieved in generations. But do not think of them as being humans with a few extra parts. Humans spent millennia mastering nature. Wildlings are nature.
Roll +Wilding when you:
Channel the nature of your animal heritage
Manifest and use physical mutations
Call upon brawn, dexterity, or physical endurance
onsort with wildlings or animals
Fight with primitive or natural
Survive in the wilderness or the native habitat of your animal genome
Hide, conceal, sneak, dig, climb, and bolt
Conclusions
In Isotope, your highest stat acts similar to character class, role, or playbook in other games, but it's not fate. Stats can change. Characters can acquire or lose mutations. A wildling may, over time, learn to me more human than most humans. A human can acquire mutations and raise their mutant stat. How does that play out over time? That's why you play to find out.