Traits - prolonged tasks

[Stormcrow]

Couldn't resist that.

Try harder.

3) The example in the book is a great example of what we are all violently agreeing on: detecting the Ambush will have a bearing only on the beginning of combat, but presumably the party is going to have to fight the ambusher either way, so the consequences are minimal.

Who-ho-ho-hoa! The fight is inevitable? That's called a railroad, and is generally considered to be bad adventure design. I see no reason in the example to conclude that a fight is inevitable.

(If, on the other hand, the party had a chance to avoid combat completely and it was a serious adversary, then I'd make him roll.)

I'd congratulate him on good thinking and give him the automatic action.

[Rich H]

Thanks all.

Figured what I'm going to discuss with the players and the small changes we will make

Lorimez

Good luck. Personally, I'd recommend this rule that Majestic quotes, and it was me that suggested it to people who don't like the nature of repetitive trait usage:

I had the same question a while back and the solution I came to (after feedback from people here) was to go with the following clarification:

Only one Automatic Action may be done per Scene (or per leg of a Journey).

... This has worked really well in my game. Players get to use a trait for and auto-success during the leg of a journey, an encounter, prolonged task or whatever but it also stops the repetitive usage that you don't like which is just, well, boring. It also has the added advantage that someone with two very similar traits like, say, Rhymes of Lore and Old Lore can use each of these traits in a 'scene', therefore making it an advantage for characters that focus their traits in specific areas of interest.

I'd certainly recommend it; it's a quick and simple fix to the issue you're having.

[Azrael Macool]

I don't necessarily restrict a Trait to one usage per scene, but it has to be able to make sense. The other day, while playing The Marsh Bell, a player used his Smoking trait to give Gloin some pipe-weed to help him calm his nerves. He didn't actually use it for the automatic action (so far, my players seem to prefer the advancement point), but either way, I don't think I would have allowed it again in the scene, since, well, you can only smoke so much. Though if he had come up with a different usage of it (I can't think of what it may be off top my head) I probably would have allowed it.

I might further restrict trait usage once it starts coming up in game, but right now I think just using a little common sense when asked if the trait usage would work will be fine. If the players all need to make a Prolonged Stealth test to sneak in, and the Hobbit wanted to just invoke Small 3 times, sure, why not? The other players wouldn't be so lucky, and might actually depend on the Hobbit getting great and extraordinary successes in order to get them inside, anyway.

I will say, invoking Hardy on every Fatigue test does seem like a bit of a cheat to me, and I'll probably only allow it once per leg of the Journey. Using True-hearted in every Encounter does seem a bit cheatery too, but... I might allow it only on certain rolls. Persuade or Inspire rolls maybe, but not Courtesy or Awe rolls, and definitely not Riddle. Something like that maybe.

[Glorelendil]

Try harder.

Ok, -2.

Anyway, I'm done trying to genuinely engage with pedantry and contradiction that masquerades as discussion. Until I fall for it next time, anyway.

In other news, it looks like Majestic's suggestion was to only allow a single automatic success per scene*, not one success per trait. But I'm with Rich: "once per scene per trait" goes a long way toward negating the min-max strategy of picking traits to cover diverse situations, rather than for character concept.

*I can't imagine anybody in my groups arguing about what constitutes a "scene", but if a rule is needed then how about "Any Combat, Encounter, or Journey, bounded by any of the other two." So an Encounter scene ends when the next Combat or Journey occurs, etc., resetting the traits, as it were.

[Lorimez]

Thanks all.

Figured what I'm going to discuss with the players and the small changes we will make

Lorimez

Good luck. Personally, I'd recommend this rule that Majestic quotes, and it was me that suggested it to people who don't like the nature of repetitive trait usage:

I had the same question a while back and the solution I came to (after feedback from people here) was to go with the following clarification:

Only one Automatic Action may be done per Scene (or per leg of a Journey).

... This has worked really well in my game. Players get to use a trait for and auto-success during the leg of a journey, an encounter, prolonged task or whatever but it also stops the repetitive usage that you don't like which is just, well, boring. It also has the added advantage that someone with two very similar traits like, say, Rhymes of Lore and Old Lore can use each of these traits in a 'scene', therefore making it an advantage for characters that focus their traits in specific areas of interest.

I'd certainly recommend it; it's a quick and simple fix to the issue you're having.

This is what I'm going to suggest

G.

[Rich H]

This is what I'm going to suggest

G.

Cool. Let us know how it goes.

Just to clarify, my way is to allow an automatic success per trait per scene whereas, like Glorelendil pointed out, Majestic's alteration is to only allow one automatic success per scene. So make sure you decide which way to go when explaining it to your group. Personally I prefer my way, obviously (!), because it allows players to focus their characters in key areas (eg, a scholar with Old Lore and Rhymes of Lore) and if applicable they can auto succeed twice in a scene; once for each trait. I kind of like traits to be focussed like that and compliment each other rather than being too disparate.

Sorry for labouring the above; thought it best to point it out so you can consider things fully.

[Lorimez]

This is what I'm going to suggest

G.

Cool. Let us know how it goes.

Just to clarify, my way is to allow an automatic success per trait per scene whereas, like Glorelendil pointed out, Majestic's alteration is to only allow one automatic success per scene. So make sure you decide which way to go when explaining it to your group. Personally I prefer my way, obviously (!), because it allows players to focus their characters in key areas (eg, a scholar with Old Lore and Rhymes of Lore) and if applicable they can auto succeed twice in a scene; once for each trait. I kind of like traits to be focussed like that and compliment each other rather than being too disparate.

Sorry for labouring the above; thought it best to point it out so you can consider things fully.

No I prefer your way too. Means they can have more than one automatic success if their traits suggest it.

Also considering having a reduced TN (i.e 12 on a roll rather than the 14 asked of others) for those with applicable traits i.e. Travel rolls with Hardy. Would allow them one success but would factor in still that they are skilled in a way and should cope better. Gaming Thursday so will find out more!

Thanks again.

Lorimez

[Falenthal]

I have been giving some thought to this and I have to admit that I liked how Rich's system gives a reason to overlap Traits. On the other hand, the "once per scene" system didn't fit my own way of LMing (to each his own!).

Like I said, I had been thinking how could two very similar Traits feel useful for a character (Rhymes of Lore and Shadow Lore, or Trading and Folk-lore, for example). And today, during our session, one of the players showed me how to make it happen: he wanted to discover things about the Beast of Mirkwood. With just one rank in Lore, he used his Rhymes of Lore Trait to autosucceed at the test, AND THEN he used his Shadow Lore Trait to gain the second AP (Ordinary Success plus Trait usage). Maybe not always useful (the first AP needs no Trait to be gained, and for the third one you need at least a great success, which can't be obtained with a Trait usage), but clever.

In certain situations, having two similar Traits could be used to obtain two benefits from the same situation: allowing for a test where no test would be allowed AND autosucceeding, or simple success AND Trait usage to gain the second AP.

[Glorelendil]

Hrmmm...the player rules for traits only talk about "succeeding at a task" but the LM rules (p 212) pretty explicitly tie AP to "rolls".

[Stormcrow]

Might I suggest that this discussion has veered into house-rules territory, and might be better served under the dedicated forum?