I'm not getting you, Donald. You seem to contradict me and support me in the same breath. And your percentages are just off. You're not using HW ability checks, are you?
In any case, if it's dramatic for you, then roll for it. I don't think we're really at odds on that point. If they fail, and it's dramatic, then I don't think that you can say that it's somehow indicative of the ongoing ability of the character to survive with that skill. But that may just be me.
My point is that a farmer with a 17 should, in my opinion, be able to survive. He won't do great, but he won't die, either, with some help from his community. But that's despite the fact that if you have him rolling daily against a default 14 resistance that he's going to have a nearly 50% failure rate. The rules say explicitly that they do not represent this sort of simulation.
Mike
>From: donald_at_...
>
> >Yeah, but it doesn't get a lot better with skill. Down this
> >particular road lies madness. Every day things attempted by a
> >hero fall under Automatic Success as things that nobody (much
> >less a self-respecting hero) should have to roll for.
>
>I disagree. If it's everyday stuff that's irrelevant to the
>story we don't roll for it because it doesn't matter whether
>it's a success or failure. We may also choose to abstract many
>everyday tasks into a single roll - does the PC earn enough to
>support their family?
>
>And it does get a lot better with skill. As soon as you reach
>1W there's a 95% chance of success in straight forward tasks
>and no chance of making a complete mess. If you get to 1W2 you
>will succeed. Furthermore if it's a bad harvest and there's
>a resistance of 10W the farmer with a skill of 17 will probably
>go hungry.
>
> >The resolution system doesn't resolve for this sort of stuff,
> >only for the dramatic stuff. And, as such, it gives the
> >underdog a very good chance of success even in pretty extreme
> >cases.
>
>Depends how you view the world you are playing in. If you
>consider survival is a matter of routine which no hero could
>fail at then that's so. Personally I feel that's both
>unrealistic and uninteresting - at odds with both the real
>world and most fantasy literature. It can be a source of story
>as well - the farmer fails to feed his family, can he persuade
>his brother to help out? or does his wife leave him and return
>to her mother?
>
>--
>Donald Oddy
>http://www.grove.demon.co.uk/
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