Chat

[Captain Kinkajou]

I'm with you now. I misread your original post!

Cool. I probably wasn't explaining it very well.

[9littlebees]

Rules as written for crits and fumbles, yep.

[Longfingers]

Make that 3.

As for the 'roll less than but higher idea' , I think it's a really elegant way of handling things like Sneak vs Perception where having a better skill actually matters; much better than D&D. One of my friends wrote something similar using playing cards a few years ago.

I can see the confusion in having the exact number be a crit rather than a 1 because that's what all the other retroclones do. If it's easier for folks to grok that, go for it, otherwise keep it as is for me.

[sonofotho]

Ok, I think we have a majority for crits and fumbles...

So let it be (rules as) written, so let it be done!

[LtTibbles]

Sorry I didn't way in earlier, I was also with the majority on the crits and fumbles vote!

[Longfingers]

You guys don't hang about! I started typing up a reply, got dragged into a quick meeting and by the time I'd finished and previewed my message there were 3 more posts

[Captain Kinkajou]

You guys don't hang about! I started typing up a reply, got dragged into a quick meeting and by the time I'd finished and previewed my message there were 3 more posts

Haha! I know exactly what you mean my friend. These are the perils of PbP it seems Pretty much the same thing happened to me yesterday. I started typing that Jayamanka was going to step up and open the door, had to take my daughter to her swimming lesson and, when I got back to finish off my post a couple of hours later, Haroun had nipped in ahead of me

I haven't done a lot of PbP previously. Trying not to tread on each others toes too much takes a bit of getting used to But, I'm enjoying the game immensely. I assume, within reason, we can retcon things if anyone feels that they particularly missed out - like "hey, wait a minute! I wouldn't have let that happen. I just wasn't here."

[sonofotho]

You guys don't hang about! I started typing up a reply, got dragged into a quick meeting and by the time I'd finished and previewed my message there were 3 more posts

Haha! I know exactly what you mean my friend. These are the perils of PbP it seems Pretty much the same thing happened to me yesterday. I started typing that Jayamanka was going to step up and open the door, had to take my daughter to her swimming lesson and, when I got back to finish off my post a couple of hours later, Haroun had nipped in ahead of me

I haven't done a lot of PbP previously. Trying not to tread on each others toes too much takes a bit of getting used to But, I'm enjoying the game immensely. I assume, within reason, we can retcon things if anyone feels that they particularly missed out - like "hey, wait a minute! I wouldn't have let that happen. I just wasn't here."

Glad you are enjoying things!

And if someone wants to retro post something, we can certainly do so. Assuming of course it doesn't require material changes to the story so far, etc. I will definitely try and wait for sufficient people to post before posting anything 'serious', if that makes sense.

[Longfingers]

Pbp is certainly its own beast. I did it a fair bit about 10 years ago while I was between face-to-face groups, and had a couple of quite memorable games that ran for a fair while on MythWeavers.

Really glad I signed up for this one though. Posting schedule is perfect so far (too little and you lose interest, and I could never commit to several a day because... life ) and we all seem to be playing it in the right tone. I'm being much more gung-ho with Haroun than I'd be in a f2f game!

[sonofotho]

Hey guys,

As you know, there are a few elements of 4S which are different from traditional DnD. Most of these we can figure out as we go, but there are a few that I want to proactively discuss with you so that we can try and align on how to use in play. So far I've come up with the below list that I’d like to start talking about (one at a time)

• Maneuvers and Improved Maneuvers
• Pushing the Roll vs. Luck Roll
• Learning new spells
• Attribute tests (some)
• Powerful enemies

I will post again with thoughts/questions on one of these topics and we can take them one at a time.

[sonofotho]

So, the first topic I'd like to discuss is pushing the Roll vs. Luck roll. The rules as written in the book had always been unclear to me in terms of when to use one vs. the other. But then I saw a discussion with the rules author over on G+ about the same topic. Q&A below:

Q: I don't get why there's rules for Pushing the Roll in addition to the Luck Die. The two ideas are very similar, and there's not much guidance on how the latter works. Have people tried playing with just one of the two mechanics?

A: Well, the way I see it is that the Luck Roll is for situations outside the control of the character. They jump over the walls of this fortress and the referee asks for a Luck Roll to see if there is a patrol passing by.

(More info re: Luck from Diogo from another thread) I ask them when players ask for things like “is there a barrel of beer in the pantry?”. If they are lucky, there is one. I also ask for Lucky rolls to see if guards are passing nearby, if the rocks falling from the ceiling hits them… I always give them the option not to roll too (so they avoid the chance of the dice being reduced), but then the worst happen.

Pushing the Roll is a mechanic encouraging players to try different solutions instead of only repeating the same action until they succeed. They want to pick the lock of a door to get inside the overlord's bedroom, but they failed the test. They can try again, but if they fail again something bad happens, like the lick picks break, someone sees them or something. That can't be avoided by Luck.

So, basically it seems as if the idea is to use Luck to answer questions outside your control, e.g. is there a patrol on the otherwise of the wall, is there a barrel of beer in the pantry, etc. Pushing the roll is for a character action 'retry' (although not for attacks, spellcasting, etc.). And a failure of the retry means as DM, I can introduce relevant complications.

Can I ask for your thoughts? Does this make sense? Any other areas of greyness on this?

[Captain Kinkajou]

That makes sense to me. It doesn't seem that there's much ambiguity there.

Pushing the Roll is clearly allowing you to attempt a single re-roll by trying a different approach but risking the situation getting significantly worse if you fail again. It is slightly less clear-cut to me where a Luck Roll might be appropriate (it could be all sorts of things) but I like the clarification you've found from the author that this tends to be for things beyond the character's control.

I'm not sure if this is helpful but I'd add that the way it's written in the rules also suggests that Pushing the Roll is player-driven (if the player can come up with a different approach or greater effort they can ask to re-roll but with additional risk), whereas the Luck Roll is GM-driven (if something about the situation is undetermined the GM could ask the player for a Luck Roll to see if things favour them or not).

The only potential grey-area I can think of is, I'm assuming that you wouldn't under normal circumstances be able to do Pushing the Roll on an attack or saving throw? It seems fairly clear that the mechanic is intended for attribute tests where you could re-set and re-try with a different approach or extra effort. I'm guessing that this would be your interpretation also but thought it worth confirming.

[sonofotho]

The only potential grey-area I can think of is, I'm assuming that you wouldn't under normal circumstances be able to do Pushing the Roll on an attack or saving throw? It seems fairly clear that the mechanic is intended for attribute tests where you could re-set and re-try with a different approach or extra effort. I'm guessing that this would be your interpretation also but thought it worth confirming.

That's the way I'm thinking. Spellcasting and attack rolls would be 'out of bounds'. This would be more for other attribute tests where, as you say, you can re-set / re-try.

[LtTibbles]

That all makes sense to me, luck die work sort of like fortune/fate points in other games but they're entirely in the hands of the gm.

[9littlebees]

I'm back...

I'm quite familiar with pushing rolls from a different ruleset (Year Zero Engine) which it would seem he's kind of borrowed it from (the author has been gushing about a Year Zero hack I'm working on).

But I disagree with Kinkajou. It's not about trying a different away - it's about pushing yourself harder to do the same thing. That's why there are increased consequences if you still fail. And IMO it should definitely be allowed for attack rolls (though not damage rolls) and spellcasting rolls. If you fail on a pushed attack roll, there should be some nasty consequences. If you fail on a pushed spellcasting roll, I'd say it's a straight-up mishap. Make the failure fit the roll.

[Captain Kinkajou]

But I disagree with Kinkajou. It's not about trying a different away - it's about pushing yourself harder to do the same thing. That's why there are increased consequences if you still fail.

Fair point. Re-reading, the rules do say "if the player describes how his character is putting extra effort into another try and is risking more serious consequences...", so that is clearly 'extra effort' rather than a different approach.

And IMO it should definitely be allowed for attack rolls (though not damage rolls) and spellcasting rolls. If you fail on a pushed attack roll, there should be some nasty consequences. If you fail on a pushed spellcasting roll, I'd say it's a straight-up mishap. Make the failure fit the roll.

I'm not hard over on this, I think you could play it either way. I'd be slightly concerned that you could break combat with it though. A Warrior using his Weapon Specialisation already gets a positive die. Should they decide to take the approach of pushing and re-rolling any failures, they'd have 4 rolls to get their attribute or under. If they miss all 4, then they'll get a worse outcome (fumble or whatever) but with 4 rolls that's not that likely to happen, particularly if they have a decent attribute score.

Feel free to call me Bruce rather than 'Kinkajou' by the way - that goes for everyone here. It just seems weird going by my handle.

- Bruce

[9littlebees]

Cool, I'm Matt, by the way.

Yeah, I see your point with the Positive Die, though that only applies to the warriors. Also, spellcasting doesn't give a Positive Die, and I think miscasts would be more plentiful with pushing. We would succeed more often, too, though.

I guess I'm easy with what the GM rules, I just wanted to weigh in with my own pushed roll experiences, albeit with a very different dice mechanic (d6 pools).

[sonofotho]

Thanks for the input, both of you. The rules could be interpreted many ways for sure. But I think I would prefer we not use it for combat or spellcasting.

[Longfingers]

Fine by me. After all, this is an OSR game, and in OSR games the DM is the law

And I'm Malcolm, feel free to use Malc for short!

[Captain Kinkajou]

Thanks for the input, both of you. The rules could be interpreted many ways for sure. But I think I would prefer we not use it for combat or spellcasting.

That's cool by me. I've posted a question about it at the 4S Google+ community to see what people typically do but only out of interest. As Malc says, "the DM's word is law"