Schrödinger's Well

[Glorelendil]

Most RPGs have situations where players use one of their skills to detect something, and then make a decision based on whether they detect it. Noticing traps, smelling poison, detecting lies, etc. When they roll successfully it's not a problem (well, I've always had a big problem with detecting lies with 100% certainty, but that's another topic). Where I've never found a solution I'm really happy with is how to handle the failed rolls. I'm philosophically opposed to secretly rolling for the player, and even then there's a decent chance they'll know something is up. The more you try to keep them in the dark (pre-roll a list of numbers, etc.), the further you're getting from the fun of the game mechanics, imo.

And before we go further, I've noticed a general philosophical division among gamers regarding what they mean by "roleplaying" and "immersion". I don't want to go too far down that rabbit hole, but one manifestation is that some players prioritize acting like their character would act, and other players prioritize feeling like their character would feel. Where the rubber meets the road (and forum tempers flare) is how to handle information the player has but the character wouldn't: i.e., what do you do when you know the NPC is lying, but your character doesn't?

I'm firmly in the second camp: I generally don't find it fun to pretend to believe in-game things that I know to be false (exception: unless the other players at the table don't know what's going on, and by play-acting ignorance I can suck them into the illusion. That's fun.) If you're in the first camp then the dilemma in this thread probably isn't much of a dilemma.

Let's get specific: I'm trying to figure out how to design a Hazard where a food/water resource is found, and the player has to determine whether or not it's safe to eat. Unless having them check for toxins is a regular occurrence, they'll immediately know something is up. I want my players, if they fail the dice roll, to genuinely agonize over the decision. Is it contaminated, or isn't it?

One solution I thought of is to randomize the answer with a secret roll: 50% chance it's potable/edible, and 50% chance it's not. That in turn affects the consequence of a wrong decision: in the first case the wrong decision sickens the character, in the latter case the wrong decision leaves the whole fellowship short on supplies.

There's a little bit of a paradox there, though, because if rejecting a good water supply leaves the fellowship thirsty it means they NEED water, and rejecting a poisoned water supply shouldn't change that. Personally I'm willing to hand-wave that away...if the initial coin flip lands tails it means you're short on water; if it landed heads you wouldn't have been short of water. But it's still kinda weird. What if the players say, "Ok, before we roll, do we actually need the water?" If you say yes and they successfully detect that it's bad do you punish them with thirst? Because if you say no they'll just take a pass on the whole thing.

Any input/ideas/discussion?

EDIT: I did just think of a partial solution, at least to this specific example: "You're not out of water yet, but you don't know what's ahead of you." If the water is poisoned then there's more water just ahead. If the water is not poisoned then there's no water ahead. A rules lawyer might argue, "But we rolled a 3 on the Hazards Table, and that's not Poison..." Maybe that's when you roll out the Cave Trolls: "You're right, I'm wrong. I guess the water isn't Poisoned after all. But roll Battle, Mr. Smartass."

[Hermes Serpent]

Some game systems suggest the GM rolling the skill in place of the player in cases like this but that needs buy in from the players who sometimes don't like to 'loose control' of their character. It's the same with being captured. Players rarely surrender as they assume that the monsters are murder hobos just like themselves regardless of the GM telling them that they have a great scenario lined up if they surrender. I've only seen surrender as an option acceptable to players where the setting positively encourages ransom for money and it's seen as a standard practice.

[Glorelendil]

Some game systems suggest the GM rolling the skill in place of the player in cases like this but that needs buy in from the players who sometimes don't like to 'loose control' of their character.

So what do you do when the players says, "Hmm...I can only think of one reason you would have rolled for me, so I won't drink the water."

[Indur Dawndeath]

Hi Glorelendil
I think I would play this as a Hazard episode.
Hunter, roll hunting to supply the party with food and healthy water. On a failed roll narate how he suplied the company with foul water and apply the chosen effect.
But if it is part of an adventure where the situation is, there is no water except this pond and you are thirsty. The skill roll must be initiated by the players. "I check the quality with my healing skill to see if it is safe to drink". On a success he will know if it is safe...

Dont know if this was what you were after?

[zedturtle]

One potential solution for this would be to have a passive score for the LM to consider, ala D&D 5e's passive Perception. For example, if you value the Feat Die at 5 and each Success Die as 3 (slightly below average, in other words) then a hero with 3 ranks in a skill would have a passive value of 14. That could be a useful metric to consider.

But, ultimately, I don't see the (storytelling) value in 'Gotcha' stuff like this. I'd be more tempted to describe the water as brackish and funny-smelling, but possibly safe. Then heroes could roll Awareness to watch if animals drink from it (or live in it), Healing to know if it's ultimately potable, or Craft to rig up a still or filtration device (probably doesn't fit into TOR's default assumptions, but who knows...). They gives the heroes interesting choices instead of just outright failure to find the 'trap'.

[Glorelendil]

One potential solution for this would be to have a passive score for the LM to consider, ala D&D 5e's passive Perception. For example, if you value the Feat Die at 5 and each Success Die as 3 (slightly below average, in other words) then a hero with 3 ranks in a skill would have a passive value of 14. That could be a useful metric to consider.

But that doesn't allow players to do anything interesting. It's one thing if there's still a trap to disarm or an ambush to counter, but in the case of tainted water it's either, "The water seems bad" or "Guess what...you drank bad water" without even a dice roll.

But, ultimately, I don't see the (storytelling) value in 'Gotcha' stuff like this.

Oh! Does my solution feel like a gotcha? Basically it's "If you succeed at the roll you win; if you fail you still have a 50% chance of winning by guessing."

I'd be more tempted to describe the water as brackish and funny-smelling, but possibly safe. Then heroes could roll Awareness to watch if animals drink from it (or live in it), Healing to know if it's ultimately potable, or Craft to rig up a still or filtration device (probably doesn't fit into TOR's default assumptions, but who knows...). They gives the heroes interesting choices instead of just outright failure to find the 'trap'.

But in all those cases there's still the original problem: if you fail at the Awareness/Healing/Craft roll you still know the LM wanted you to roll for some reason, so why would you drink the water? Yeah, they get to think of creative ways to use their skills, but at the end of the day there's no actual suspense.

[zedturtle]

I think we're having a mismatch of expectations or experiences. In the final analysis of my proposal, the water is known to be suspect. If the heroes fail their rolls, then they still have the interesting decision to make whether or not to take a chance on the water. If they succeed, then they learned something interesting and valuable (whether or not the water is safe).

[Glorelendil]

I think we're having a mismatch of expectations or experiences. In the final analysis of my proposal, the water is known to be suspect. If the heroes fail their rolls, then they still have the interesting decision to make whether or not to take a chance on the water. If they succeed, then they learned something interesting and valuable (whether or not the water is safe).

Ahhh, I see. You start off telling them it smells funny, but they don't know if it's actually potable. Success at the tests either confirms it is bad, or purifies it.

But that means it has to potentially be good water that just smells funny, and your players have to also know that sometimes you drop non-traps (the opposite of a gotcha?) in their way. And where this gets tricky with Hazards is that Hazards are supposed to have consequences: succeed at a skill roll or pay a price. If the heroes fail all their skill rolls and it turns out the water was just fine...what was the Hazard?

[zedturtle]

I actually would probably roll the die (1-3 bad, 4-6 good) in front of them to find if the water was good, after a successful skill test. As far as what the Hazard was, it could have just been the resources (Hope, etc) expended, or maybe on a Sauron the heroes encounter another complication (their futzing around has attracted attention).

[zedturtle]

It's also possible that a failure might represent inadequate information... perhaps those are frog eggs that can be seen in the water, or maybe they're mineral deposits. Of course, that gets back to the player/character information divide. But I think that is inescapable: as a player, I know exactly where the Ruling Ring is hidden, but my hero has a complete understanding of Westron (as it is really spoken, not transliterated) and many tales that are only referenced in the Red Book, or don't appear at all. Both of us (hero and player) would benefit from an information exchange, but that's not possible.