I disagree with this. Failure can mean that the obstacle is not overcome. Doing it the way you suggest means that obstacles are not really obstacles and the conclusion is already decided with the roll only determining details. To me that's like going into a combat and knowing the you're going to win--the rolls are just made to determine how stylishly you do it, and defeat isn't really an option. My style of play has failure and defeat as very real possibilities, and I wouldn't enjoy a game that didn't.

And in most cases I would absolutely agree with this. But this was, from the beginning, an example made to illustrate the "fail this roll and the adventure stops"-type of situation. If this door we're using as an example was tangential to the whole adventure, if there was nothing of essential importance behind it, I would treat a failed skill check as a failure to open the door. But if the single clue that will move the adventure forward is behind the door, then you as a GM need to ensure that a failed check doesn't mean everyone has to pack up their dice and go home.

The adventure would not stop. If you break into a bank and fail to open the vault, there's still a story to be told. Hopefully it's one where you get away to try again.

I agree with you HaapyD, in my games failure and player frustration happens often, but this is a subject of a different discussion (although there is a relation with the current subject, I agree).

The GM is the one who sets the parameters for what a successful check actually accomplishes.

I think this is the key. The GM and players have to clearly define what the intent of a task or checks is, if this is clear, interpreting failures, advantages, successes, threats, despairs and triumphs is way easier.

A big deal about this subject is discussed in the Burning Wheel rpg. I would really recommend every GM to at least read it (if not play it a couple of times), it is really enlightening for GMs and players alike.

The adventure would not stop. If you break into a bank and fail to open the vault, there's still a story to be told. Hopefully it's one where you get away to try again.

This is not what the OP asked. The question was very simple "how do you deal with failed checks that HAVE TO BE succesful...?" Sure you can make it into a "you're way is bad fun" and "the story doesn't have to stop" type if discussion to show how 'awesome' your game is but there are other topics enough for that.

The adventure would not stop. If you break into a bank and fail to open the vault, there's still a story to be told. Hopefully it's one where you get away to try again.

I don't think you guys are really in disagreement. In the OP the GM felt he was at a wall and didn't know how to proceed. The exercise here is not really about how to handle failure, it's about how as a GM to keep the story moving no matter what dice results the players get. The story may not keep moving in the direction the GM originally planned, but that's the challenge and the fun...we either roll with it and let the story evolve in a new direction, or we try to steer the story back on track. Either way is fine so long as point of failure is meaningful and the story is served.

Your example of a bank job would be fine for letting the story evolve. But if there was a ticking clock, eg: the princess is going to be executed shortly, the GM has to steer the story back somehow, and you can't allow a locked door to impede progress, though it can certainly add complications.

:DAn executed princess that the PCs failed to save can make for an awesome story too.

My point is that there's no such thing as checks that have to be successful.

Yes. You are projecting your game unto that of others AGAIN. Remember when you told everyone about that all bountyhunter party and people said they thought it sucked? Same thing....

Dante, I have no idea what you're going on about, but I do recall asking you to address the content of the posts rather than your feelings towards those making the posts. I'll ask you to remember that again.

Wow... I basically asked you the same thing. You are not answering on topic, you are telling the OP how you think the game should be played and how that pretty much looks like you telling him his way is wrong, you are not addressing the content of the post but go ahead point to me for doing so. I am just recalling a time when that happened to you and I remebered you being pretty pissed off by that.

Let me illustrate what it is that bothers me about this exchange.

Him: "Hi, how do I get a steak medium rare?"

You: "You don't need steak. You can use tofu! Using steak is wrong!"

Me: "That's not what he asked for. Remember when that happened to you about the all rice dish?"

You: "Stay on topic! Leave your feelings towards me out of it or I'll put you in my ignore signature! I can do no wrong!"

I am directly addressing the subject by saying that there is no such thing as a check that must succeed. I don't recall the old conversation you're referring to, so send me a link in a PM if you'd like to discuss that.

LET'S MOVE ON ಠ_ಠ

I am directly addressing the subject by saying that there is no such thing as a check that must succeed.

In your game. How do you not see the staggering arrogance in your replies?

Dante, are you trying to be hostile? I'm sharing my opinion on how to handle the OP's situation. You're not doing that--instead you're taking shots at me.

HappyDaze isn't the first to say that he doesn't craft stories that blow up if a roll isn't made; in fact, I said it and so did many others. Please, let's move on and get back to providing something useful to OP and the casual reader.

Dante, are you trying to be hostile? I'm sharing my opinion on how to handle the OP's situation. You're not doing that--instead you're taking shots at me.

I am neither hostile, nor "taking shots" I just really don't understand how you don't see this.

Dante, are you trying to be hostile? I'm sharing my opinion on how to handle the OP's situation. You're not doing that--instead you're taking shots at me.

I think the problem here is that you’re taking your statements of fact about how you run your game, and you’re presenting them here as if they are the only possible solution to the question being posed.

You can run your game however you want, and others are welcome to do the same. But it is rather arrogant to make your statements in such a way as to imply that your solution is the only one that could possibly exist.

Maybe that wasn’t your intent, but that was what I received.

I'll try one more stab at this and then I surrender. The dice and the overall mechanic are narrative, or at least they are supposed to be. When a GM sets up a skill check, if you craft the check around needing success to proceed you've reduced the dice from a narrative tool, into a 2 dimensional linear mechanic. It doesn't matter if you then use a DP, GM fiat, or additional rolls or different skill checks, you've moved the flow of the story from narrative to 1+1=success, which is far too literal and clunky for my tastes.

In this case the OP posted, at my table the roll would be gaining entry to the facility. The skill used could vary, computers for a locked door, stealth for a patrolled perimeter, athletics for scaling a fence, whatever, it's irrelevant. The results of the roll aren't going to be defined as succeed/fail, they will be stunning success 'a stealthy benchmark for ninja to follow', all the way to 'how many guards do you think there are??' The point being the roll adds to the story, it doesn't force a pause in the action simply to determine up or down.

There really is precedent when you consider combat, you can miss, which is a failure, and yet still have spare Advantages and Triumphs that can used to great effect. No reason a locked door has to be reduced to 'lock, or unlock, there is no maybe...'

In some regards this is a collaborative work of fiction.

The players are we hope the good guys and the story we are telling is about them, this is their story.

I see the original question speaks to me on two aspects of telling a story. First do the good guys always win? Second where are we in the arc of the story?

I think the second of the questions I have speaks more to me, a good story has a beginning, a middle with several anti-climaxes, a conclusion/climax and an end. A campaign is the linking of several stories, each consisting of these narrative parts.

So, here we are and the players get to that door, failing to open that door mid-story can be just another anti-climax, fantastic for the story if it is a deeply emotionally felt failure. Luke and Han barely escaped the Death Star in their first encounter and Obi-Wan was killed, if the music doesn’t give it away as being the most perfect example of an anti-climax that is deeply felt by the characters then I don’t know what is.

Same door, but the story is almost at an end, the GM has been hinting that the players are about to enter the lair of the evil lord and they players have fought their way past a vast army of Minions. Now at this point the players stall. Now, the GM can take this on the chin and allow the evil lord to escape. Perhaps the players discover that the evil lord was planning to kill thousands of people with a virus and they prevented that. So the session still ends in a climax, Luke is in a Bacta tank and Han is frozen in carbonite. The players may well feel gutted, (Australian slang for really bad), their story isn’t finishing with a huge victory but an almost anti-climax.

The players come back next week and there they are fighting over Endor, and that blasted door just won’t open. Han can’t deactivate the force shield, the Rebellion is destroyed and Luke kills Darth Vader and becomes the Emperors new apprentice. No freakin’ way man!! Our story isn’t going to end like that, you are trying to open that door and it just won’t budge. Long story short what if some small furry creatures showed up and helped attack a back door?

Back to my first question: Do the good guys always win? I think ultimately they should, but they shouldn’t expect to win every time.

An end is only an end if that's what you make it. There can always be a sequel (or even a trilogy of sequels) if the PCs need to try again.

True and I understand what you are saying. Not every door has to open every time.

However. Do you think that a never ending story is one that people want to play in? I don't at some point that door has to open and that story end so that a new one can begin.

Going from one failure to the next, that can't be fun over a long period.

I'm not suggesting constant failure, nor constant success. I see the fun in going with however it works out. If you don't want to fail then you keep improving to improve your odds of success. Even then, you might fail even at the worst moment. Of course, you also might succeed when the odds are totally against you too. Dealing with such risks and rewards has proven to be fun over the long term.

I agree with 2P51 on this one. The failing forward method can get GMs out of spots when a roll is made and failed when the story seems to require the roll to succeed.

If a GM requires a roll for the story to proceed, then the GM must be aware of choices of what to do if the roll fails. The GM can use the failing forward method and have the action successful but with concequences. The GM can have alternate methods to accomplish the goal. (Such as going in through a window when a door is locked.) Or the GM can choose to not have a roll made at all.

Keep in mind that the failing forward shouldn't be used on every dice roll. For example, my players were trying to find a traiter on a Rebel base. They were following up on one of my red herrings and wanted to open a locked door to break into her apartment to search for clues. Since it was a red herring, when they failed the rolls (the dice wern't with them and they failed Skulldugery, Computers, and Mechanics to open the door as well as Athletics to bash the door open but advantages kept letting them try with other methods without damaging the door) I said they couldn't gain access into the room. If they were on track of the traiter and the plot at that moment hinged on them getting into the room, then their failure would've opened the door but set off an alarm. Threat or Advantages at that point could be used to increase or decrease the amount of time it takes for security to show up or leaving obvious clues to the break-in.

I still think you're all saying the same thing and talking past each other. This is about the GM having an out so the story and the game doesn't come to a crashing halt. That's exactly what "failing forward" is, and it has nothing to do with whose style of play is better.

If you *want* the PCs to get past the door, then:

a) you shouldn't have made it a skill check, maybe instead the PCs have already been given the access code, or;

b) you use Jamwes' suggestion above that failure = open door + alarms, or;

c) you make it a staged success check, meaning they need at least, say, 3 successes to get in. This is tedious, but can be useful retroactively if you realize you made a mistake by putting a skill check here, but still want the players to proceed. To keep everyone else from being bored, you're advised to give the other PCs something to do while they wait...and of course, the longer it takes, the more likely there will be added complications, but it gives you a little "real time" to think about it while the players are busy.

If you are ready for the PCs not to succeed, and your story doesn't hinge on the PCs getting past the confounded door, then you "fail forward" in some other way. You let the "chips fall where they may", so the PCs might have to beat a retreat.

The latter is just as valid as the former, what it comes down to is how committed you are to your story arc, and how much of a barrier to that commitment the locked door is.

In my view as a GM I always define what "success" and "failure" mean for a given roll.

If success means that they open the door silently and failure means they open the door but alert the guards, that's how we do it.