>> > But if he gets the 3x transfer,
>> >then he gets 18 points and more power to him. If the beast can be
>defeated
>> >by losing 18 points, then his leap somehow defeated it. Do I care that
>> >leaping "shouldn't win" the contest? Not at all - perhaps the beast felt
>> >secure while it was a hedge away from the hero and now it decides to
>flee.
>> >Or he landed on its gouty foot. Or he actually *did* manage to hack at it
>> >while sailing through the air.
>>
>> Well of course that isn't at all what I was suggesting. What I was
>> suggesting is that if 18 AP doesn't defeat the beast there is no
>> reason to worry that the beast would be defeated even if it
>> "shouldn't" be. The jump is fixing a problem - the hedge is in the
>> way.
>
>And if the beast only has 17 AP left? Should I worry that a 6 AP
>"positioning" action can win the fight when it "shouldn't" ? Or should I
>tell the player that he can only bid 5, because jumping won't win the
>contest?
There's a reason HQ is a narrative game: It's about telling stories, and sometimes the story isn't quite the one you expected.
"OK, Tostig's going to try and jump the hedge so that he can hack at the monster's neck next turn. I'm bidding 6AP"
Tostig rolls a 1, the monster rolls a 20.
"Tostig vaults the hedge easily, the monster sees him jumping, lunges in his direction but gets a foot tangled in the cottar's entrails/a root/etc and falls. Tostig lands, holding his sword above the monster's exposed neck. It struggles for a moment but realises that it's got no chance and yields."
Now I admit that this HAS ended the contest before the expected end - the creature has surrendered instead of being killed, but it would be a perfectly valid end in any game I was running.
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