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(I know, I know - "let it go, GAZZA, it doesn't MATTER")...
Something still bugging me.
Let's say you have to face up to a god, a superhero, or something equally nasty. What sort of skill do you need to have a reasonable chance?
The answer is: 20. No mastery needed. A score of 20 will suit you in good stead even against a resistance of 6, 8, or 10 masteries.
Why? Because if you spend a single Hero Point, you end up with a 95% chance of a critical and a 5% chance of success. Now, against a resistance with 3 or more masteries, they'll automatically get a critical as well - but that's in the whole "Narrator decides" category, which is a lot better than any sort of Defeat.
I therefore have a proposal: if you bump with a hero point, the effect is to give you an extra mastery for that roll only. So rather than directly bump your result, it gives you an extra mastery. In the above case, your expenditure of a Hero Point is completely wasted, since the extra mastery would be cancelled.
Of course, that means that Hero Points can only affect the outcome of a contest that is otherwise going to be close. If that's not acceptable, then add in another rule that you can spend more than 1 Hero Point on a contest, although you can end up with no more than 1 mastery less than your opponent, no matter how many Hero Points you spend. You can always spend 1 Hero Point even if you already have equal to or more than the number of masteries your opponent has.
For example:
Albert the Stickpicker (Close Combat 20) decides to challenge Harrek (Close Combat 6w6, say). Let's say that Albert has 10 Hero Points. If we're resolving the combat with a Simple Contest, then Albert can get a Narrator Decides outcome 95% of the time for the cost of 1 Hero Point - which is really hard to accept, considering that Harrek ought to be able to squash Albert without even consciously realising it.
Using my proposal, Albert would need to spend 4 Hero Points to even force Harrek to roll. At that point, Albert has 20w4 vs Harrek's 6w6, which cancels to 20 vs 6w2. Should Harrek roll a 20, then he only get a success (although he'll still probably win). Albert could, if desired, spend up to 5 Hero Points to go up to 20w5 vs 6w6, which cancels to 20 vs 6w. Still gives Advantage Harrek, though, and note that Harrek can spend a Hero Point of his own now to squash Albert.
This probably needs work.
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GAZZA
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