I think it's legit to choose not to participate in more of an "active" roll - you choose not to try to Charm the guard, you choose not to try to be sneaky, choosing not to observe in detail, etc.

I don't think you should have a choice in participating in "passive" or "instinctive" rolls like Cool, Vigilance, Resilience, certain perception rolls, etc.

Venthrac and I chatted briefly about this on our campaign forums. I just had a few thoughts, some of which are echoed by others in this thread.

Rolling dice leads to the potential for advantages and triumphs as well as failures and threats, and there are times when we [as GMs] bank despairs and triumphs for later in the session, and sometimes advantages and threats add nuance to the narrative. I know I adjust a few things based on the number of threats or advantages I see rolled.

I get a big kick out of seeing the results and what happens with the story when Gand tries to Negotiate or Charm somebody. Rolling 1Y vs. 2R 1P 1SB is fun!

People opting out of rolls, IMO, are missing the point of collaborative story telling.

I get a big kick out of seeing the results and what happens with the story when Gand tries to Negotiate or Charm somebody. Rolling 1Y vs. 2R 1P 1SB is fun!

People opting out of rolls, IMO, are missing the point of collaborative story telling.

That's a good point. This particular game system was built around a narrative dice system. Taking the dice out of the game potentially diminishes the game.

Oddly though I did have a campaign that ended up crashing and burning where the players were Insurance investigators...

"Do you read Sutter Cane?"

I allow players to opt out of rolls when I call for "group rolls" or similar. For example, if someone is trying to sneak up on/past the group with Stealth I might say something like, "anyone who wants to can make a Perception check". Since not everyone is good at Perception, those less skilled often forego their check while the better characters roll theirs. I actually encourage this, since it keeps things from getting bogged down in multiple rolls and me having to figure out what to do with a fistful of Threat.

Of course, if I tell one specific player that he has to make a check, then he has to make a check. I don't think it has ever even occurred to anyone at my table to forego one, they all love rolling these dice.

As a GM, I'd rule it based on the skill check.

For example, I usually consider Perception to be an active check, where the characters are looking for something specific. I probably wouldn't ask everyone to make a Perception check, unless the entire party was actively searching.

However a Vigilance check, I might ask the whole party to each make Vigilance checks, and I might have uses for Threats generated from such a check. Maybe they're in a bad part of town, making Vigilance checks to determine whether they spot the gangers creeping up on them from an alley. Threats might affect that--more threats might mean more gangers.

In such a case I'd say I wouldn't consider the check optional. It's not your character choosing to take an action, it is just a check to see how the character reacts to something which is happening anyway.

This.

There's a story in dice rolls, even if they only net bad results - and that's one of the beautiful things about the system. If players begin opting out of any checks that are difficult, in order to avoid Threats and Despairs, then it takes something vital away from the game.

If a task is obviously difficult - and option - then I'd allow them to walk away: say, if a character with minimal equipment wanted to try patching up the damage to his ship, only to come to realise just how badly damaged it was (higher Difficulty), then that's fine; however, if a character has already begun entering into heated negotiations with someone, I wouldn't allow it: even if you try to backpeddle out of a discussion with someone, you've already committed yourself at some length or another to the talk - and that will affect how the other individual views you.

This can be abused, as I found out in my game: one player kept trying to convince an NPC to part with more gear for a mission, but refused to make a Negotiation check in order to see whether things went his way or not (because, as he said, he's likely to get Threats and Failures); but despite not making the roll, he continued to press the NPC in-game, attempting to haggle and bypass the roll.

I didn't like this: sure, good roleplaying should account for something, but it shouldn't veto a check entirely (add a few Boost dice, yes, but not veto). It smacked of metagaming - and the player himself even admitted as much, I think.

I think we really are metagaming this when we are trying to opt out of skill checks, but we are also thinking too much in terms of d20-based rules when we as GM's ask everyone to make individual checks for something that really is a group effort.

For example, instead of asking everyone to make a skill check, give them the option to assist someone else in the party. That way, instead of rolling their own dice, they're adding a boost die to the mix without adding any purple dice.

Think of it this way, if a GM asks everyone in a party of 6 to roll an average perception check, regardless of what the players are able to roll with their own skill checks, the whole party is going to be rolling against 12 purple dice.

On the other hand, instead of rolling 6 different checks, you could roll 1-2 assisted checks against far less purple dice. Skilled assistance would work really well, but even unskilled assistance adds a boost die to. So instead of choosing not to roll, they can choose to assist someone else... even if technically it'd be a passive skill check.

I think there's a lot of confusion in most of the examples I'm reading in this thread between active skill checks, where a player decides to make a check to affect the environment, and reactive ones, where the environment forces a check upon a player.

For example, most of the posts I'm seeing that cite Perception (an active skill) should be using Vigilance (a reactive skill).

I get a big kick out of seeing the results and what happens with the story when Gand tries to Negotiate or Charm somebody. Rolling 1Y vs. 2R 1P 1SB is fun!

People opting out of rolls, IMO, are missing the point of collaborative story telling.

People worry a lot about the consequences of failure or threat. What they need to understand is - temporary failure or Bad Things don't preclude an ending in their favor. It's just frequently more interesting to win against the odds rather than victory being all but assured.

For example, most of the posts I'm seeing that cite Perception (an active skill) should be using Vigilance (a reactive skill).

Probably the best distinction between the skills I've seen.

I think there's a lot of confusion in most of the examples I'm reading in this thread between active skill checks, where a player decides to make a check to affect the environment, and reactive ones, where the environment forces a check upon a player.

For example, most of the posts I'm seeing that cite Perception (an active skill) should be using Vigilance (a reactive skill).

I feel like most of the posts in the thread have been making exactly that distinction. Perception is for when you're looking around and Vigilance is when you have a chance to notice something that is happening.

Had this come up in a game recently where my character was trying to use Charm to defuse a situation peacefully. I was rolling 1G 1Y, and when we saw the difficulty pool of 4R 1P, another player blurted out that I shouldn't attempt this, and I told him to stop with the metagaming cheese.

Hm, yeah, that makes a good case either for concealing the difficulty from the players (ie, rolling the difficulty dice behind a screen), or for saying they cannot choose not to make the attempt once they learn what the difficulty is.

But that's a different subject altogether.

Thanks for your thoughts and opinion, guys. There are many good insights here. Score one for the awesome EotE community

Had this come up in a game recently where my character was trying to use Charm to defuse a situation peacefully. I was rolling 1G 1Y, and when we saw the difficulty pool of 4R 1P, another player blurted out that I shouldn't attempt this, and I told him to stop with the metagaming cheese.

Hm, yeah, that makes a good case either for concealing the difficulty from the players (ie, rolling the difficulty dice behind a screen), or for saying they cannot choose not to make the attempt once they learn what the difficulty is.

But that's a different subject altogether.

Thanks for your thoughts and opinion, guys. There are many good insights here. Score one for the awesome EotE community

I don't agree that's necessarily metagaming and bad. You can often tell when you're talking to somebody how receptive they'll be to your attempts to charm them.

Jay Little talks about describing the action the players are about to attempt as he pushes forward the various purple, red and black dice.

"So you're attempting to charm a guy who clearly has a pretty stern personality (pushes forward two purple and one red) and who seems to be giving you a sidelong glance as if he might not care for your species (pushes forward a black die). If you'd like to charm him, build your pool and roll it..."

Then you can decide whether or not to try it. It just depends on what makes sense in your game. Maybe if you have know way of knowing anything about the NPC (like you can't see them, have never interacted with them, etc) then it makes less sense but I'd be cool with it anyway.

I'm one that believes players should know how difficult something is before they pick up the dice and roll it. As progressions mentions, by putting the difficulty up front, the players have the option of choosing not to take the risk. If they do pick up the dice and roll it, they are doing so knowing full well that it is a risky move.

It may give them thoughts about trying something different, to which I would then provide a different difficulty pool. I wouldn't call someone yelling out "it's too hard" as metagaming at all.

Think of it this way. You're in a group of people where one person is debating whether or not to do a parkour leap between two apartment buildings. You know for a fact that this person is lousy at parkour, never mind any sort of gymnastics, and is likely to fall if he attempts it. So do you keep silent and let him jump, or do you inform him that you think the jump is too risky?

If you do tell him to stop, Is that metagaming? No. That's you assessing the difficulty yourself, and the ability of the individual, and stating an opinion.

By putting the dice on the table you're weighing ability vs. difficulty and risk vs. reward. It's not an exact math, but rolling 1Y and 1G verses 4 red and 1 purple should be a cue to a player that taking such an action would not be wise. You don't need to know that such a roll has an 11% chance for success...

Think of it this way. You're in a group of people where one person is debating whether or not to do a parkour leap between two apartment buildings. You know for a fact that this person is lousy at parkour, never mind any sort of gymnastics, and is likely to fall if he attempts it. So do you keep silent and let him jump, or do you inform him that you think the jump is too risky?

In the age of internet, the failure is videoed and uploaded for the world to witness.

Pushing dice forward as an indicator of a check's difficulty is sinister, I'll admit, but I think the issue of a player refusing to roll on the grounds of possible failure+ is more a matter of passive checks rather than active. If you're pushing dice at a player, that's an active check, a participatory decision, and one the player is more than welcome to decline. If the GM is calling for the player to make a passive check vs X (vs an ambush, lets say), refusing the test shouldn't really be an option. Again, I say the dice aid in determining the narrative parameters, and simply failing to notice the aforementioned ambush is dull by way of narrative. Failing to notice the ambush and having the check also result in Threat and/or Despair raises the stakes, and is the players' cue to actively participate in the developing story, rather than being a blinkered bump on a log.

If a player said "I don't wanna roll because I might get a handful of Threat, and I don't wanna have that hanging over us in the coming encounter", fine. I'd say "You roll, or I roll for you and throw a DS Destiny point at it as well." And this would be explained to all my players before session zero.

Think of it this way. You're in a group of people where one person is debating whether or not to do a parkour leap between two apartment buildings. You know for a fact that this person is lousy at parkour, never mind any sort of gymnastics, and is likely to fall if he attempts it. So do you keep silent and let him jump, or do you inform him that you think the jump is too risky?

In the age of internet, the failure is videoed and uploaded for the world to witness.

Touché

Pushing dice forward as an indicator of a check's difficulty is sinister, I'll admit, but I think the issue of a player refusing to roll on the grounds of possible failure+ is more a matter of passive checks rather than active. If you're pushing dice at a player, that's an active check, a participatory decision, and one the player is more than welcome to decline. If the GM is calling for the player to make a passive check vs X (vs an ambush, lets say), refusing the test shouldn't really be an option. Again, I say the dice aid in determining the narrative parameters, and simply failing to notice the aforementioned ambush is dull by way of narrative. Failing to notice the ambush and having the check also result in Threat and/or Despair raises the stakes, and is the players' cue to actively participate in the developing story, rather than being a blinkered bump on a log.

If a player said "I don't wanna roll because I might get a handful of Threat, and I don;t wanna have that hanging over us in the coming encounter", fine. I'd say "You roll, or I roll for you and throw a DS Destiny point at it as well." And this would be explained to all my players before session zero.

As I mentioned before, I don't think they can opt out of a role, but maybe give them the choice to assist another player if they are within range to do so. If they're standing by themselves, then yes, a roll must be made. If they don't roll, you roll for them, in front of them. I wouldn't kill the destiny point though.