One Ring Encounters?

[Stormcrow]

Second entry (usually 2-3): The companions achieved the goal they set for the encounter, but nothing else.

Exactly the problem.

Goal: Convince the suspicious farmer to take in an injured comrade.
Introduction: Character uses Insight to determine how the farmer will react to seeing a wounded adventurer. [SUCCESS 1]
Interaction: Character uses Persuade to convince the farmer to take them in. [SUCCESS 2]
Reward: The characters achieve their goal, but no more... But they already achieved it with Persuade! So... no reward?

There's another example of a problem in Tales from Wilderland. You're hired for an adventure, and based on the number of successes you get in the job interview, your pay is better. But surely one of the questions during the interview will be, "How much will you pay us?" And just as surely, one of the players is going to try rolling something to try to haggle over the price. But how do you answer this if you can't calculate the pay until the encounter is over?

[Rich H]

Second entry (usually 2-3): The companions achieved the goal they set for the encounter, but nothing else.

Exactly the problem.

Goal: Convince the suspicious farmer to take in an injured comrade.
Introduction: Character uses Insight to determine how the farmer will react to seeing a wounded adventurer. [SUCCESS 1]
Interaction: Character uses Persuade to convince the farmer to take them in. [SUCCESS 2]
Reward: The characters achieve their goal, but no more... But they already achieved it with Persuade! So... no reward?

Why is that a problem? They've achieved what they want, have 2 successes, so that matches the tier doesn't it - their second success was their successful Persuade roll? They can either stop now, having gotten what they want or if they have other ideas (or the LM has built in rewards) push on with the scene. If this isn't the case then you need to explain a little more clearly what your issue is - as it seems to be working okay for what you want here. I'm not seeing the issue. Also, If the LM knows that other things are on offer (ie, he's built a success table for this particular encounter) then he can shape the interaction developing the conversation further and allowing the PCs to make further rolls.

There's another example of a problem in Tales from Wilderland. You're hired for an adventure, and based on the number of successes you get in the job interview, your pay is better. But surely one of the questions during the interview will be, "How much will you pay us?" And just as surely, one of the players is going to try rolling something to try to haggle over the price. But how do you answer this if you can't calculate the pay until the encounter is over?

If you're struggling with it's application then don't use it - the Encounter Rules don't always fit perfectly and if they don't they should be dropped or tweaked as required. You seem to be creating the problem by applying a subsystem that you can't work with. Personally, I'd use some common sense and if I was running the encounter rules for this particular scenario, I'd run it as the job application and based on the number of successes I'd have a sliding scale of pay. I'd then let the player characters haggle and maybe shift the result up, or down, a level or two. So, the Encounter would measure how much they impress the prospective employer, the resulting successes would be what the employer is willing to offer (varying by tier), and the characters could then haggle. If a player wanted to haggle beforehand (ie, as you were working through the job interview), then as in real life, a common sense response would be "hang on son, you're jumping the gun here. I'm not actually sure you're suitable, so lets discuss capability first and then I'll tell you what I'm willing to pay you".

[Stormcrow]

Why is that a problem? They've achieved what they want, have 2 successes, so that matches the tier doesn't it

They get the benefit of the farmer's assistance because of the successful Persuade task, not because they achieved some number of successes that makes the farmer like them.

Also, If the LM knows that other things are on offer (ie, he's built a success table for this particular encounter) then he can shape the interaction developing the conversation further and allowing the PCs to make further rolls.

Is that a train whistle I hear?

If you're struggling with it's application then don't use it

I'm not struggling with its application; I'm saying the rule is broken. It encourages dilly-dallying for the sake of building up extra successes. It makes you dance around your true objective, because rolling for exactly that would only be a single success.

the Encounter Rules don't always fit perfectly and if they don't they should be dropped or tweaked as required.

Let's not forget, or forget to tell people who ask, that as of right now the "successes rule" is not in the core rules.

I'm not saying the rule can't work; I'm saying it can't substitute for the consequences of the rolls themselves. You achieve the encounter goal by performing tasks; you impress an NPC by succeeding. Impressing an NPC is not always the goal.

[bert1000]

Why is that a problem? They've achieved what they want, have 2 successes, so that matches the tier doesn't it

They get the benefit of the farmer's assistance because of the successful Persuade task, not because they achieved some number of successes that makes the farmer like them.

Also, If the LM knows that other things are on offer (ie, he's built a success table for this particular encounter) then he can shape the interaction developing the conversation further and allowing the PCs to make further rolls.

Is that a train whistle I hear?

If you're struggling with it's application then don't use it

I'm not struggling with its application; I'm saying the rule is broken. It encourages dilly-dallying for the sake of building up extra successes. It makes you dance around your true objective, because rolling for exactly that would only be a single success.

the Encounter Rules don't always fit perfectly and if they don't they should be dropped or tweaked as required.

Let's not forget, or forget to tell people who ask, that as of right now the "successes rule" is not in the core rules.

I'm not saying the rule can't work; I'm saying it can't substitute for the consequences of the rolls themselves. You achieve the encounter goal by performing tasks; you impress an NPC by succeeding. Impressing an NPC is not always the goal.

Yeah, we don’t need no stinkin’ d20 logic here! Listen, I play and enjoy all kinds of games and am definitely not a d20 fanboy. In fact, right now my go to system is FATE which is even more story oriented than TOR. The FATE math is also transparent and pretty solid. So it’s not like a good story first game and solid mechanics are at odds.

Also, it’s not me saying “let’s port 4e Skill Challenges to TOR”. The designers have laid out an Encounter sub-system that has a resolution system that works exactly like 4e Skill Challenges (particularly the Tales of the Wilderland version). Although poorly laid out and not in one place, a lot of this is in Core though too. P.22-23 of the Loremasters book talks about Prolonged Actions and an Encounter is basically a specific example of a Prolonged Action. In fact, convincing someone to help is specifically listed as an example in the table on p.23 with a suggestion of 5 successes needed. Will it always be a Prolonged Action to convince someone? No! But Encounters are an example of when it is.

If you don’t want to use the subsystem, that’s fine. But don’t pretend I’m trying to bolt on some kind of restrictive d20 system into TOR. This is what the designers have outlined! I’m just trying to figure out how to best implement it (which includes understanding the math).

Now, a lot of people hate Encounters/Skill Challenges for many reasons and can’t make them work for their group. They end up with a really mechanical dice rolling fest that doesn’t engage the fiction enough with everyone inventing silly reasons to use their top skill. But for people reading this thread and getting into the concept of Encounters/Skill Challenges for the first time, let me assure you that it doesn’t have to be that way. I have played in and run very fun Skill Challenges that engage the fiction, dynamically change, and create an interesting prolonged conflict. It’s definitely more of an art than a science but it can be done.

Stormcrow, if you see potential benefits from Encounters/Skill Challenges but can’t figure out how to make it work and genuinely want to understand how it could work, then let’s have a discussion. But seems like you and Sirkicley are not engaging in the original intent of my OP at all. Basically your position seems to be

A “I don’t understand how this Encounter subsystem will add value to my game, so I’ll ignore it. And I’ll state the worst possible interpretation of how it might work for those who are trying to figure out how to use it in their games. ”

Vs.

B “what exactly did the designers have in mind with this Encounter sub system and what are the best ways to make it a value added part of my game?”

I’m not sure why you come into a thread with a premise of B and consistently try to push A.

[bert1000]

I'm not struggling with its application; I'm saying the rule is broken. It encourages dilly-dallying for the sake of building up extra successes. It makes you dance around your true objective, because rolling for exactly that would only be a single success.

Again, the whole point of the Encounter/Prolonged Action subsystem is to allow for multiple checks against a common goal in order to model a more prolonged conflict.

Individual rolls within an Encounter do have consequences, they just don’t necessarily get you all the way to your goal.

For example, say we are in an Encounter outlined in my earlier post with 4 successes before 2 failure and the goal is to get on good terms with the woodman village head in order to receive lodging and information on dangers in the swap. 2 success = lodging, 4 success = swamp (the swamp knowledge takes a better relationship to get out of him. Example of play follows.

Barding player 1: Having spotted some holes in the village defensive wall. “Brundel son of Brogo, looks like you could use some extra hands in mending your wall. We have strong backs and would gladly spend the day in labor for a roof over our heads tonight” (rolls Persuade for a Success)

Loremaster NPC: Brundel looks to village’s wall and gives a knowing sigh then looks your party over, “Tis true, we could use the help but the last strangers that received our kindness stole 2 days bread from our pantry” Brundel looks directly at the Elf, Elridriel. “You arn’t those sorts, are yeh?”

Elridel player 2: “Brundel son of Brogo, I am Elridel son of Ethidel son of Arathin. I have stretched my legs in the Mirkwood before you were born. I have killed a Mirkwood spider with this dagger alone. I have ridden a raft off the Frinel River waterfall. My people keep the darkness back from your very doorstep. No we are not those sorts. “ (rolls Awe, Great Success = 2 Successes for a total of 3)

Loremaster NPC: “Elridel son of Ethidel son Arathin, of course I meant no disrespect. You can just never be too careful these days. You and your companions may of course stay under my roof” Calls to a yeoman “Prepare four beds in our largest chamber in the longhouse and our best ale!” [2 successes before 2 failures = yes to lodging]

Barding player 1: “Thank you Brundel son of Brogo. Your hospitality is well felt. We ride for the swamp tomorrow. Any news from the place will be welcome”

Loremaster NPC: Brundel looks east toward the swamp and suddenly looks tired beyond his years, then turns back to you. “You have a long day of wall mending ahead of you. Some things are better talked about by the fire. After supper then. I wish to hear news from Laketown as well”

[after the wall mending and supper, sit down by the fire, same Encounter]

Loremaster NPC: “I trust our meager fare is sufficient? Good. Our food may be simple but I’ll wager our ale against Laketown’s finest. So tell me news of Laketown. Do know if my brother, Brandle, has returned from Gondor?” [someone must make a Lore roll]

Barding player 1: [rolls Lore and fails, total of 3 successes and 1 failure]. “I’m sorry Brundel but I have no news of Brandle. Many are the comings and goings in Laketown these days”

Loremaster NPC: Brundel shoulders slump and he takes a big swig of ale. “Yes, I suppose that’s true” he whispers and stares into the fire.

Hobbit player 3: I start singing a soft tune about brothers, men from the old days, taking different path and reuniting. To the tune of Puff the magic Dragon… “dundin was the clever one and set off to north, garin had the strength of ten and took the southern rode…” [rolls Song, success. 4 successes and 1 failure, enough to get swap info]

Loremaster NPC (4 successes, 1 failure): Brundel smiles as the tune concludes. “Ahh, the Brother’s Circle. One of my favorites. And Brandle’s too. You have warmed a heart said to be made of stone. Now, you mentioned you were going to the swamp tomorrow. No one goes in the swamp any longer but… [tells them useful stuff about the swamp]

OR let’s say the Song roll failed and Tolerance was reached.

Loremaster NPC (3 successes, 2 failures): Brundel frowns and cuts you off before the tune concludes. “The Brother’s Circle. Ahh you have that right. We have walked our different paths, and I do not know if we will ever see each other again. “ Brudel downs the rest of his ale in one gulp. “The dark is growing deeper and I have duties to attend. Ride safe tomorrow”

Barding player 1: “You said we would talk of the swap”

Loremaster NPC: “There is nothing to talk of. The swamp is a dangerous place and none of us venture there anymore. Goodnight”

*****************

All of this flows from the roleplaying and fiction first.

[bert1000]

TN14 is the "status Quo".

Convincing Eomer that Aragorn was no foe of the Riddermark - Status Quo.
Convincing Tree Beard that the hobbits were not orcs - status quo.
Convincing Farimir not to take the weapon of the enemy to his draconian father. much harder. (TN 18).

This is based off of what the LM wants. How hard he wants it to be. If the group of players opts to dump all of their 10 starter skill points into Travel and Weapon skills and no one has social situation skills....you're setting yourself up for failure. I'm not interested in dumbing down the encounters based off some algorithm of how hard it should be for the group just because only one person has a 2 in a social skill and no one else has above a 1.

It's merely much harder or simpler than status quo should it be based on the LMs consideration of the situation. This is based off the status quo of TN14; not based off of what the party's average skill level is.

Finally - alot of the math goes right out the window once you add in the creative roleplaying of players who use their traits and distinctive advantages to the extent of their imaginations. D20 algorithms cannot equate for this because it doesn't exist. Thus it's much easier to quantify the exact math and algorithms because you do NOT have that "chaos theory" aspect to deal with in D20 games.

I'm not talking about tailoring challenges to a particular party. I'm talking about for example having a sense for the basic odds of success when a party that heavily invested in social skills goes up against a challenge I think is suppose to be moderately hard.

For an Encounter/Prolonged Action knowing the TN is not enough. The difficultly is also influenced by X Successes before Y Failures and the values of X and Y.

What if I was able to do the math and I told you that a party that heavily invested in social skills (3s in all skills) would fail a TN14 Encounter with 4 successes before 2 failure 70% of the time?

So what I thought was a moderately hard encounter is actually pretty damn hard even for our social skills party and impossible for a less social party. That was not intention and these are the kinds of things that happened in 4e Skill Challenges because they didn't do the math before release.

Again, I'm not saying this happens in TOR. I don't know. But I do know the odds go way down for multiple rolls even when the single roll odds are high. That's why on p.22 on the LM's book there is some advice on lowering TNs for Prolonged Actions. This is never talked about as far as I know in the Encounter sections but the Encounter sections are pretty scattered.

Of course we can't account for all possibilities and creative use of traits, etc but why would this invalidate the need to know the baseline odds? You are assuming the single roll TNs directly translate to X before Y Encounters and they don't necessarily do. I am willing to SWAG once I have those basic odds.

If you reject the concept of X before Y Encounters then this doesn't apply of course...

[bert1000]

Let’s take a Loremaster who is thinking about setting up an Encounter. Hmm, the party needs to get friendly with the head of the local village who can at the least give them lodging and with some good conversation can give them hints on how to protect themselves in the swamp where they are headed next. The chief is wary of strangers but always looking for news from outside his area so it should be fairly easy to get him to lodge them and tough but not too tough to get him to open up about the swamp dangers.

The Loremaster sets it up as average TN14 checks, TN12 for Lore if they talk about news from other places. 1-3 successes and they get Lodging, 4+ successes and they get swamp help as well. The village head values Valor and the party has highest Valor of 2 and no other modifiers apply. The Party has an average of 2 in relevant social skills.

And here is where I find the rule about counting successes to be a problem. The goal of an encounter is not what you get by accumulating successes. The goal simply guides you in choosing tasks.

In your example, the goal is twofold: obtain lodging, and obtain information. A party spokesman or member might logically ask to try a Persuade task to get lodging. They roll and succeed. Now they've got lodging, right? Not if you're basing it on the number of successes obtained during the encounter. To do it that way, you've got to perform tasks based on anything but a direct approach. It makes no sense.

The only way that the number-of-successes rule makes any sense is if the reward is something that the NPC offers the characters simply because they like/are impressed by/pity/etc. them. It's not something you are trying to get—for that you'd roll for a specific task.

So the probabilities involved here aren't actually vital to the game. Encounter rewards are about things you don't ask for. They represent how much the NPC appreciates you, not a task you've achieved.

For instance, you can ask a woodman for lodging with a roll of Persuade, but it's your number of successes during the encounter that determines whether he puts you in the barn or invites you into his longhouse.

I think I've made my perspective clear now, but this is a great example of you rejecting the premise. If you decide that circumstances are that you can get lodging with a single Persuade roll and that failing that roll would end your chances, by all means do that.

BUT, if you think that it would require several positive interactions before getting lodging (whether by persuade or other things) and there is some room for error as well, then run an Encounter.

As I've show with the example of play, it's very easy to interpret a roll/success as making progress toward a goal vs. getting the goal in its entirety. Even when "asking directly". The NPC can always hesitate, put barriers in the PCs way that require more checks, etc. and do this in an organic, flows from roleplay way.

It does take some skill to do this but a lot of groups can get there if they are all on the same page.

[Rich H]

Also, If the LM knows that other things are on offer (ie, he's built a success table for this particular encounter) then he can shape the interaction developing the conversation further and allowing the PCs to make further rolls.

Is that a train whistle I hear?

Okay fella, you constantly make snarky remarks like this, and have done for some time, so lets call it a day; I'll have nothing else to do with you and will ignore your posts - I've tried to be respectful to you when we disagree but you can't seem to return the same level of respect and continuously make remarks like this and others at me.

[Rich H]

I'm not talking about tailoring challenges to a particular party. I'm talking about for example having a sense for the basic odds of success when a party that heavily invested in social skills goes up against a challenge I think is suppose to be moderately hard.

For an Encounter/Prolonged Action knowing the TN is not enough. The difficultly is also influenced by X Successes before Y Failures and the values of X and Y.

I think this is going to be very difficult to get at Bert as, like you say, the math is difficult to get at and there are so many moving parts that can affect it - eg, great/extraordinary successes on one roll, use of Hope, invocation of traits, etc.

Just some thoughts, not trying to make any real point with the following but taking a look through TfW, we have the following Encounters along with Tolerance (and potential variances)...

Of Leaves...
Tolerance: Valour + 1 (per hobbit in party) + 3 (due to Dodi being desperate for help) + highest Standing (of any hobbit)

Success level follow the norm of 0-1, 2-3, 4-6, and 7+, each level generally increases the Treasure he's willing to reward the PCs but higher tiers get additional rewards.

Kinstrife...
Tolerance: Valour + 1 (if a Beorning/Woodman is spokesperson) - 1 (if there are any elves/dwarves in group) + highest Standing (of any Beorning)

Success level follow a different scale of 0-1, 2-4, 5-7, and 8+, with level rewards ranging from "find my kinsmens killer if you ever want to set foot in my lands again" to Beorn extending his blessing.

There's also an additional Encounter at Stonyford...

Tolerance: Valour + 1 (if a Beorning/Woodman is spokesperson) - 1 (if there are no Beornings/Woodmen in the fellowship) + 1 (if PCs declare they are on a mission for Beorn, or 2 if it's with his blessing) + highest Standing (of any Beorning)

Success level follow a different scale of 0-1, 2-4, 5+, each level increases the information and cooperation the villagers will extend to the party.

And a judgement at the Carrock...

Tolerance: Wisdom + n (based upon Oderic's actions) + highest Standing (of any Beorning)

Success level follow a different scale of 0-2, 3-5, 6+, each level lessens Oderic's punishment.

I've not listed them all and there are others in the book but they don't follow the Encounters format outlined within the introductory section so I haven't listed them here.

This still doesn't help clarify the maths but based upon those encounters we have interactions whose success tiers number 3 or 4 ranging from 0 (for the lowest tier) to 5 - 8 successes in total (for the upper tier).

For a TN of 14 with a skill rating of 3, the probability of success is 70%. Now some of these are going to garner great or extraordinary success results and PCs can also use Hope to boost those near misses and change them into successes if they think the Encounter is of a critical nature.

I guess what I'm trying to suggest is that the maths isn't easy to get to, so proving what you're already concerned about. Personally, as 0 - 1 success gets the bare minimum to continue the adventure and Tolerance is going to be around 3 most of the time then I think there's opportunity for hitting those tiers in the mid range some of the time. It's the Tolerance that is the key though and this can swing greatly depending on the gaming group. That to me is the key variable so perhaps we should focus on that, fixing/assessing the difficulty of an Encounter based upon it:

Subject of Encounter is... Chance of > Minimum Success... Tolerance Rating should be...
Hostile... ... .... Very Low... ... ... 1
Suspicious... ... ... Low... ... ... 2 - 3
Neutral... ... ... Average... ... ... 4 - 5
Amicable... ... ... High... ... ... 6 - 7
Friendly... ... ... Very High... ... ... 8+

[Apologies for crappy formatting of the above table]

... Those are just finger in the air estimates but it would mean that starting and developing characters would rarely reach the higher success tiers as they wouldn't be able to get high Tolerances due to low Valour/Wisdom and Standing (where applicable). I think this is an intent of the design though.

[Evening]

.

Also, If the LM knows that other things are on offer (ie, he's built a success table for this particular encounter) then he can shape the interaction developing the conversation further and allowing the PCs to make further rolls.

Is that a train whistle I hear?

lol