No, its that its allowing something to happen rather than just "roll dice. nothing happens. roll dice. nothing happens" - kinda interrupts the flow of the game, wouldn't you think?
I do not regard it as broken, thanks.
> > There's been a lot of debate on this in the past but you have to
admit
> > it cuts down on useless die-rolls!
>
> I don't see how. You mean if your augmenting ability is so low it's
> not worth the trouble to try?
No, I mean if you roll, something WILL happen -- for good or bad.
None of that "Roll dice. Nothing happens. Roll dice. Nothing happens."
> > > Less often a success but less often a failure too...
> >
> > Ah, but why roll dice if you don't mean it? HW is much more
magical
> > than RuneQuest, I find. And didn't you just hate rolling to see if
> > your Battle Magic spells worked and rolling and rolling and
rolling?
> > =(
>
> Rather less so than rolling and rolling my Feats and finding them
> working backwards, actually. Being forced to go for
ultra-conservative
> augments feels neither "magical" nor "heroic" to me. (One of the
basic
> problems is that you stand to "lose" the same thing as you're trying
to
> "gain", so there's no real sense of meaningful trade-off, or
> "sacrificing everything for victory", etc. (Hence the logic of the
> "penalise the augmenting ability" suggestion.))
That's why auto augments, as suggested by a few folks here, are a useful trick. They are more useful to a new player and new hero who might not be willing to risk a devastating failure when he's relatively weak.
> > > Just wanted to see what people think of augmenting etc...
> > >
> > > Should it be so win/lose or should it be more win/lose/draw?
> >
> > I prefer it win/lose. That means the players are much more careful
in
> > going for those big augements... since they know its quite likely
they
> > could end up with a -5 instead of a +5. Too many players play
silly
> > games with probablity as it is...
>
> I don't see how the augment rules in any way discourages playing
> such games. If anything, one might say it just makes the
probabilities
> sillier. (I might post my analysis of "optimal" augmentation
targets
> and expected augmentation benefits, just to see RR wince. <g>)
I was referring to auto augmentation. And I admit I like to have my dice checks be meaning full.
If a player knows that there's not going to be a downside (because you've massaged the probablity to make it less likely) then they are more likely to go for big augments, which tends to unbalance the game at the lower end. A +6 augment makes a lot of difference when you've got a 17 ability.
I'd suggest checking the archives for the threads on that subject. There might be something in there you could use. But it might be reopening a can of worms...
Jeff
Powered by hypermail