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Sep 7, 2012 -- 11:33PM, CarlT wrote:

Under a system where there is a minimum low roll, both the expert and the newbie succed at the hard task equally often.  Is that really a rational system? 

Initially the point was that the expert doesn't fail at trivial (to them) tasks.  So that players can feel safe in attempting things their character should be versed in.  In addition it is impossible for them to critically fail any task they're trained in.

Is it not normal to simply tell players that they can't attempt certain tasks since they're not trained in them?  Like telling the fighter he can't attempt a knowledge roll on the magical texts that the wizard failed to interpret (because there is no reason for him to know how to read magical texts)  Thus the newb isn't even capable of attempting things the expert would attempt.

Can you propose something that doesn't simply add an extra modifier for skills you're trained in?  Perhaps involving level ups, since the current system requires you to remember that you have a +3 to the skills you didn't improve at all, while you may have other skills that are +3 and one thats +2 on top of that original +3.  It feels really unnecessarily math based.  Not that simple addition kills games for a lot of gamers, but it bogs down things especially for new players in my experience.

I had imagined a list of DCs like the one in the dungeon master guidelines for higher level play (perhaps one for levels 5+, another table for levels 10+, etc.)  Where some tasks that were once standard are now assumed, and what tasks that were once difficult are now your new standard DC.  Since you're facing tougher and more worldly enemies it would make sense that their chance to detect you/hide from you would be about the same as it was at low levels (in 4e terms, they scaled up as you did- but I don't think we need to add the modifier to both sides to add something useful to it)

 

Sep 8, 2012 -- 11:31PM, diversionArchitect wrote:

Sep 8, 2012 -- 2:22PM, Saelorn wrote:

From a design standpoint, though, it makes sense for the die to be on the same scale as the modifier, or else you end up with a system that's dominated by random chance (if the die is much larger than the modifier) or where random chance has significantly diminished influence, (in the case where the modifier exceeds the scale of the die size).

I didn't really follow what you were saying here.  Can you give an example?

Under the current design space, the die roll goes from 1-20 and the modifier goes from -4 (no class/skill bonus, ability score of 3) to +12 (maximum skill bonus +7, ability score of 20) for a spread of 16.  Assuming that they left four points of wiggle room for future development and minor circumstance modifiers, we can say that the modifier is on the same scale - it matters just as much - as the die roll.

I would argue that it is preferable for this to be the case.  It means that someone with every possible advantage - the +16, in this case, including those four points from higher-level training or minor circumstances - can succeed at tasks where someone with every possible disadvantage would always fail.  If the DC is exactly 17, then the master does not need to roll at all and the absolute most deficient character - with (-4) to the roll - cannot possibly succeed.  (It would be slightly clearer if they moved the whole system about four or five points to the right, to make modifiers also range from 1 to 20, but whatever.)

It's pretty neat, because it prevents the whole "Str 3 wizard succeeds to bend bars when Str 20 fighter fails" worst-case scenario, but it also leaves a lot of room for normal gameplay.  Under most circumstances, the wizard is going to have at least Str 5 (probably closer to Str 8, if these forums are a judge), so she'll only have a reasonably small chance of success compared the auto-success of the fighter; and of course, the fighter probably won't have Str 20 right off the bat, and can't pick up the skill training until much higher levels, and can't count on a +2 from having the appropriate tool at hand (or whatever).  It gives a wide range of DCs where the trained character is likely to succeed and the untrained character is likely to fail, but also includes significant border scenarios where the untrained character has a decent shot of success (but the trained character is guaranteed) or where the trained character might fail (but the untrained character has no chance).

Contrast with your proposed system, where the only modifier is from -4 to +5 and the die roll is still 1-20.  In your system, anything with a DC higher from 6 to 16 is a scenario where the incompetent pipsqueak might outdo the master.  Given the sheer volume of dice being rolled in that range, this sort of thing would be happening fairly frequently.  Following your first suggestion for mitigating the effect, the clumsy wizard who is merely trained at stealth could outdo the dashing swashbuckler who isn't trained, and actually benefits more because her total is more likely to otherwise fall below 10.  (And of course, your proposal doesn't affect combat accuracy at all, which some people would find of equal concern.)

Also contrast with, say, high level 4E.  In late 4E, modifiers to checks and DCs could easily reach +25, creating a scenario where otherwise-relatively-competent people could fail entirely because the target was just so far beyond their ability.  That's actually a relatively mild example, since they did go out of their way to contrive that everyone would stay in the same level range.  Maybe late 3E would be a better example, where you could have 20 ranks in a skill and another +10 from an item, +5 from ability scores, etc... (and the less said about Glibness, the better) - th die roll pretty much became a formality after a certain point.

I'm sure you could see the trend that would result by keeping the range of modifiers from 1-10 while decreasing the die roll to, say, on an extreme, a d4 or a d6.  It would frequently result in scenarios where the weak person has zero chance or the strong person had no chance of failure, leaving very little room for fun and manageable play with intermediate DCs.  Fortunately, nobody has been arguing in favor of this, so I won't feel so bad that I don't have more time to go into detail.