I was just wondering how often my fellow Lore Masters are awarding advancement points for players failing at a skill in a dramatic or memorable way.

I'm still getting used to the rules and still getting used to awarding advancement points in general.

I must admit I've kind of overlooked the reward of points for failing so far. I've also not really come across anyone on these boards mentioning it, so I thought I'd start a topic about it.

Anyone got any interesting examples from play?

Has anyone else overlooked this?

I've used this once. A Woodmen of Wilderland wanderer with a bent towards healing entered a village in the Western-eaves after an Orc massacre. For the entire Fellowship, I called for an Orientation test upon entering the village, because the carnage was so overwhelming and disorienting. Specifically to her part in the story, she failed the test. I didn't narrate any consequence at that moment. Her player-hero began seeing to those still alive. As the day wore on and turned to dusk. They found a woman who was gravely injured and, had she been discovered at the outsell could have been saved. But the healer, bewildered by the senseless Orc destruction had missed the woman in her first pass (a triage of sorts). That was a dramatic failure caused by her failing the Orientation test. (No Eye or anything in the roll. Her roll was a normal failure, the dramatic consequence was purely a function of my narration.) She received an Advancement point for that and has gone on to develop her Explore skill as a consequence.

Best,
E

Here is an interesting thread started by evilgaz on April 12 about awarding Advancement points in general. It includes the idea of awarding Advancement points for failures. It's a couple of pages of reading, but worth the read.

Advancement Points, Getting more AP

Those were great comments and, I must say, I agree with them.

Just a randome musing...

It's interesting the word chosen by the designers was "invoke" and how that correlates to invocation. Thinking of Tolkien's fundamental definition of magic: To make the will more quickly affective...

in a sense, that is what a player does when they invoke a Trait for an Advancement point (the desire is to advance and develop your character so this affects a quicker realization of that desire) as well as an auto-success (the player-hero wishes to accomplish something and the invocation of a Trait accomplishes this without delay).

Early on after TOR was first released last year, I remember a thread that brought up the question of why TORs designers didn't provide LMs a system of guidelines for flavoring their Adventures with a Tolkien-styled "subtle" magic. This at the least if they were not going to design a "magic-system" for TOR. There was this feeling that the designers missed something vital. Of course, after play began and players became more familiar with the system, people began picking out subtle rules that provide player-heroes with the feeling of being part of a magical world through cultural virtues and blessings, etc.

I wonder if this is another one? More so if the designers have read Tolkien's letters that deal so explicitly with magic and Art. The Trait mechanic could read as an example specifically tailored to Tolkien's definition or so it seems to me...

Then again these might be better classified as confused musings than random...

Thoughts anyone...?

Regards,
E

Thanks for the link JamesRBrown, I must have missed that thread. It was an interesting read and helped a lot.

I guess this thread could still be used to give examples of dramatic failures and also dramatic successes that have made made by players in game. (Or maybe a new thread could be started).

I think it would be a good inspirational resourse for new players and Lore Masters if folk here shared a few tales.

I had a very interesting roll last session in my game. The player rolled against the standard TN14 and rolled 2 sixes and a three for a total of 15. They also rolled the Eye of Sauron on the feat die. So, an extraordinary success with the implication that something bad or shadow related could happen as a result. That roll definitely got an advancement point.

I think this could work well. Maybe there should be a "trait makes you fail" option. You can invoke a trait, explain how it gets in the way, and automatically fail at a task. If you do that, you check off a box for that skill category. The second and third checks should be for increasingly easier rolls, or rolls that are very important.

Valarian,
Interesting dice roll indeed.

Sounds like the character grabbed the chandelier, Errol Flynned across the room, delivering a mortal blow to the Evil Leader, let go of the chandolier and did a backflip to successfully land on his feet on the opposing balcony. Bowing to the accolades of his awed companions, the character smacks his head into the balcony railing and knocks himself unconscious.

Nicely said Garn! And that would be a perfect example of how the Loremaster could use Unconsciousness without a hero's Endurance points dropping to zero (see the thread Losing Consciousness, A Maturing Device).