Success rate of skill checks

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Murcushio
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Re: Success rate of skill checks

Post by Murcushio » Fri Aug 29, 2014 10:55 pm

I'm not sure I understand the nature of the complaint here.

People with four or more ranks in a skill are supposed to be awesome! They're supposed to regularly succeed at things involving that skill without needing to spend Hope on it. That's kind of the point.

PCs are supposed to grow in power so they can confront greater and greater threats. There's something to be said for deliberately under-statted and lower-powered games, of course, but you seem to be taking the tack that people becoming really skilled at something and succeeding at it a lot is a bad thing.

If you have a group that's been playing so long everybody has everything raised to four or more, I can see it being an issue. (That can happen if you have groups that are just naturally taking a very long time to get things done, such that they gain a lot of AP and XP before they age out. Or a party largely of dwarves and elves.) But even if that's the case, now you have a party of badass heroes out of legend. Give them some legendary challenges. These guys should be slaying dragons and fighting Nazgul and founding kingdoms.

And if you really want to talk about Travel becoming trivial... I'm playing a Beorning. Twice-backed Honey Cakes is eventually going to render even the Mountains of Mirkwood a not-very-hard check to pass for the entire party. :)

JoeArcher
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Re: Success rate of skill checks

Post by JoeArcher » Fri Aug 29, 2014 11:28 pm

Some great answers, thanks a lot for that. I can't say that I'm convinced from a mathematical point of view, but as some of you hint at - perhaps that's the main issue. My perspective.

Since the answers you give are great and seem to be based on a good experience with the system and how it works, I'll throw the math out and just try to roll with it.

The first time I read that a trait could give an auto success I was a bit puzzled - but I guess I should accept that general theme.

I want a system that allows more focus on the story (for our wfrp campaign) and this system really seems to support storytelling. I guess I really have to embrace all of it and not worry that the system doesn't conform to my usual idea of system balance.

Once we're done with TEW, I hope to convince my group to travel to middle earth. Have tried it with MERP many years ago and later that other lord of the rings rpg (core system or something). I remember both with mixed feelings. I love the setting, but the systems just didn't support it very well. The one ring is different though and I guess I just have to resist the urge to crush the crunchy parts :)

Oh and I wasn't trying to be confrontational or anything. I asked for opinions from LMs with experience because I only had the math and wanted to know, before going in too deep and changing to this system. My math isn't wrong... but I may have looked at it the wrong way :)
Last edited by JoeArcher on Fri Aug 29, 2014 11:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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zedturtle
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Re: Success rate of skill checks

Post by zedturtle » Fri Aug 29, 2014 11:39 pm

Yeah, the trait auto-success thing comes up less often than you might think... Using a trait grants a success, but doen't provide any chance of getting an Advancement Point nor a Great or Extraordinary success. And they allow characters to have areas of competence or "shticks" that they always do... our Beorning player in my big PbP game is always describing the meals he's preparing in intricate detail; he never has to worry about failing a Craft roll when Cooking! But it's all flavour... he'll never get an AP from that, either. So it really works to build the story...
Jacob Rodgers, occasional nitwit.

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JoeArcher
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Re: Success rate of skill checks

Post by JoeArcher » Fri Aug 29, 2014 11:45 pm

zedturtle wrote:Yeah, the trait auto-success thing comes up less often than you might think... Using a trait grants a success, but doen't provide any chance of getting an Advancement Point nor a Great or Extraordinary success. And they allow characters to have areas of competence or "shticks" that they always do... our Beorning player in my big PbP game is always describing the meals he's preparing in intricate detail; he never has to worry about failing a Craft roll when Cooking! But it's all flavour... he'll never get an AP from that, either. So it really works to build the story...
Oh so when you succed automatically you don't get an AP? If that's true something just clicked here. I'll re-read the book when I have the time, but I think I see what you mean by the traits being character defining and actually having a real impact on the game mechanics. Cheers :)

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zedturtle
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Re: Success rate of skill checks

Post by zedturtle » Sat Aug 30, 2014 12:41 am

JoeArcher wrote:Oh so when you succed automatically you don't get an AP? If that's true something just clicked here. I'll re-read the book when I have the time, but I think I see what you mean by the traits being character defining and actually having a real impact on the game mechanics. Cheers :)
Yep, check out page 212 in the new rulebook. Note that a successful roll is required; and Traits might allow an AP for a special roll; but using a Trait for an auto-success does not earn APs.
Jacob Rodgers, occasional nitwit.

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