Re: Re: Contest Questions

From: L C <lightcastle_at_...>
Date: Sat, 03 Oct 2009 20:14:29 -0400


Mike Holmes wrote:

>>In my game Bruno's player he still gets to choose what he does --
always. System removing choise from players is never cool in my books.
>
>Is anybody in disagreement on this? I don't think so. What you're
calling "removing choice" I'm calling "making the character uncool."

*nod*
I think we're actually all more or less in agreement on this point.

>That said, I could get into a long rant about where one draws the line
between character intent, and character success always being equal. We always want to be cool, but we aren't always, in the real world. >I agree that since it's fiction, that it's OK to allow player intent to be born out in most cases, in fact more than most GM's. For instance I won't even make a player roll for success in combat unless I feel that
>they're interested in the possibility of failure.

I look at it more as "unless the possibility of failure is interesting", but I don't think we're too far off.

>What... you'd have them roll to successfully kill a rabbit caught in a
trap? Do you get my zen point? It is always and everywhere a subjective choice as to when to have a player roll for their character's >success.

Absolutely.

>Again, not sure what "micro-goals" are, but, yeah, if it would suck to
roll, don't roll. That's clearly embedded in the rules.

I think it is stated very strongly in both HQ1 and 2.

>?? So... you'd let them roll again, and only keep the result if it's a
failure? Or... Not seeing what you're saying. But to be clear on the other perspective, it's not saying that the character can't say "I want to do >it again" it's saying that when you resolve the roll, the narration of the outcome is, "Well, he tried lots and lots of times, and failed again and again. Then he decided to do something else."

Right. I think "No Repeat Attempts" becomes very easy the moment you stop viewing the roll as being about resolving a single task/attempt. It's the sum of what you're trying to do to accomplish this with this trait/in this situation.

>>I think I will actually allow retries for the winner from now on:
they might lose this time, in which case they will keep losing -- so a retry is a gamble. You might get a better result, or you might lose what
>>you've gained -- which is fine with me.
>
>Wait, they've already got what they want, no? So why would they bother
"trying" again?

I think he's aiming for the "parting shot" idea, where you improve your win result. Of course, you can do that with Hero points, so it does seem a bit redundant.

>At the risk of sounding patronizing, I think you might still not be
seeing player intent. If the contest is to leap the chasm, presumably there's some reason why they're doing this (this is, in fact, a classic
>example). Why is the player having the character leap the chasm? It's
an obstacle in the way of something. Yes, if the player rolls a complete defeat, it might be fun if the situation is right, to have the
>character plummet to their deaths. But what happens on a marginal
defeat? Do they also fall to their deaths? That doesn't seem mandated by the rules, and, I'd argue, is missing out on addressing the player's
>intent.

I view this as you do here as well. I'd be hard pressed to think of a situation where one jumps the chasm just to jump the chasm.

>Let's say it's a standard dungeon crawlish situation, and there's a
treasure on the other side of the chasm. The leap is then intended to get to the other side to obtain said treasure. Failure in this case means >that the character simply doesn't get the treasure. That can be accomplished in a lot of ways, but the simplest is that the guage the leap, and decide it's too far. After all, the probably don't have a tape
>measure, probably have never bothered to measure exactly how far they
can leap, and their "Leaping Bound" trait here is all about how much confidence that the character has in terms of how far they can >go.

I always tend to think of the "leaping the chasm to escape pursuit" example. Failure there can range from plummeting to your doom to failing to even make the jump to making it but the pursuit is still on your tail.

>I mean... you wouldn't argue that the die roll represents some
tremendous variation in how far they can actually leap, right? I mean, sure, they might slip or something, but their maximum distance isn't really >all that variable. They either actually can leap that far, or they can't. The question of whether or not they do is bases on whether or not they think they can.

Eh. I'd say there is a fair amount of variability, even among Olympic jumpers. Not to say the mental game isn't hugely important, especially in the adventure genre.

>That's the point. Looking at any such contest out of the context of
play, not knowing the player, or the character in question and what the player likes about the character, you can't make this call. There is no
>game logic that applies here that says "Chasm Leap: the stakes are X."
You have to be thinking about what the player's investment is in this particular case, and what they're interested in seeing, not only as
>success stakes, but as failure stakes.

Yes. This is both a strength and a weakness of the system, I think. Or rather, it's part of why it plays the way it does, so if it isn't working for what you're trying to do, a different system might be in order. No system does everything equally well.

> (Once again, that's for HQ, not HQ2, with which I haven't enough
familiarity, to say nothing of experience, to be able to comment on directly).

I would say that, if anything, this is even more explicit in HQ2.

LC

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