Actors are used to describe everything that can take an Action in the game, even inanimate objects that only “react” to the Actions of Players. Actors are analogous to Characters (PC/NPC) in other game systems, but the No-Dice RPG takes this concept a step further and uses Actors to describe everything: objects, buildings, terrain features, cities, planets, whatever.

Having Abstract Actors is important for a couple reasons:

1. They provide a consistent way to document anything in the game with a single, universal Stat Block.
2. They set the difficulty level of the Actions of PC Actors (Automatic or during Hands) when interacting with the environment

• Abstract Actors—refers to the broad category of any type of Actor that is not a sentient being (PC or NPC)
• Environmental Actor—refers to a type of Abstract Actor that represents the environment that the PC Actors can interact with (a tree, a kitchen, a city, et. al.).

Abstract Actors often do not have a full Stat Block of 9 Attributes. Some may be missing, or represented by a dash “—” like: R1/0(27/0)-M-(-/-/-)-B3(3/3/3)-S-(-/-/-). This is because objects do not have a mind, or a spirit, they only have physical characteristics (Body). But a sophisticated robot may look like this: R1/0(27/0)-M3(3/3/3)-B3(3/3/3)-S-(-/-/-), representing the fact that it's programming is advanced enough that it has a Mind, but no Spirit.

See Non-Numeric Attributes for how Missing Attributes effect play.

Abstract Actors may deal any kind of Damage (Mind, Body or Spirit), it is not determined by the Aspect that was played like normal Actors. This is to ensure that damage caused by Abstract Actors maxes sense in the unfolding story. The GM decides what type of damage an Abstract Actor causes, and this may change each time it causes damage.

See Failure Consequences (Damage) for examples.

Sometimes, Abstract Actors may not actually be able to be Destroyed, although it is always possible to Eliminate them as an obstacle. For example, if a PC Actor is traveling through Terrain that presents a barrier, the Actor could take some Action to cause damage to the terrain (like light a forest fire), and if that did enough damage to reduced the Terrain's Body Attributes to 0, the forest is Eliminated as an obstacle, but the Terrian (forest) Abstract Actor doesn't disappear from the world, instead, the path that the Actor is traveling ceases to present an obstacle.

In other cases, like a PC Actor breaking an object, like smashing a ceramic pot that they suspect contains a snake, if the pot's Body is reduced to 0, then the pot is truly destroyed and that Abstract Actor is removed from the game.

The GM always determines which outcome makes more sense in the fiction, and describes the outcome as part of role playing the Scene.

Sometimes Environmental Actor Sheets may list another Environmental Actor in an “Inheritance” field. This is to signify that some Environmental Actors are contained inside a larger Environmental Actor. For example, an Inn may be in a City that is in a Forest. We say that the City “inherits” the Forest, and the Inn Inherits both the City and the Forest.

When PC Actors are adventuring in the forest, the difficulty of their Automatic Actions is determined by the Forest's Stat Block, but when they enter the City the GM will use that Stat Block instead, and when they enter the Inn, difficulty is determined by the Inn's Stat Block.

Inheritance gives task difficulty more variety, because the Attribute of each different Environment can be different. Inheritance is more important when the Abilities Extension is used, because Environmental Actors also Inherit Abilities of their parent Environmental Actor.