Test your Warhammer GM skills!

By NezziR, in Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay

Scenario 1: A straight forward example

A bandit (Int 3; R1) has been cornered in an old barn. He has taken a hostage and says he will kill her if he is not released. The bandit is panicked, add 1 Misfortune dice to social interaction with him. The local Constable (Fel 3; Guile trained; C1) uses 'Honeyed Words' to coerce the bandit into coming out by telling him that he will be given a fair trial and that his crimes, thus far, do not warrent a death penalty.

Note: R1 means '1 Reckless'; C1 means '1 Conservative'

Reference Material:

Honeyed Words card: www.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/wfrp/warhammer-fantasy-roleplay-action-cards/actioncards_HoneyedWords.png

Bestiary Sample: www.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/wfrp/warhammer-fantasy-roleplay-enemies-npcs-monsters/WFRP_BestiarySpread.pdf

Dice Reference: www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp

nice set up.....what is the test tho?

Well, we don't know exactly how opposed tests work.

It's easy to get that the constable has 3 blue dice (Fel), and single yellow die (basic training in Guile). In addition, one of his blue dice must be converted into a green die (C1), and we add a single misfortune due to the panicked state of the bandit.

So, 2x blue, 1x yellow, 1x green, 1x black.

What we don’t know is how the opponent’s characteristic (Int, in this case) and skill level (Intuition) correspond to challenge dice and additional misfortune dice. I don’t know that a pure 1-characteristic = 1-challenge die works, since that makes almost every opposed test seem extremely difficult (since that’s normally at least 3). It might be what happens, but it’s something I’d have to try out if this is the case. Plus, if the opponent is trained how does that affect? Additional challenge dice, or misfortune dice?

Personally, off the top of my head I’d set a difficulty level for the task normally (probably 2 in this case), and then I’d add a challenge die if the opponent’s characteristic was higher, and another if the opponent was skilled in the appropriate skill.

So, in this case, I’d just add 2 challenge dice, since Fel = 3 and Int = 3. If the bandit was trained in Intuition (or had a 4 Int), then I’d add another challenge die. Of course, this is all without knowing what the rules are, or having played. It could be well conceivable that since the bandit's Int is 3 the number of challenge dice is 3.

dvang said:

So, in this case, I’d just add 2 challenge dice, since Fel = 3 and Int = 3. If the bandit was trained in Intuition (or had a 4 Int), then I’d add another challenge die. Of course, this is all without knowing what the rules are, or having played. It could be well conceivable that since the bandit's Int is 3 the number of challenge dice is 3.

that or if he is trained in something to combat Guile...an insight ability of some kind.....then at a challenge die for each lvl of training

This would realy depend on whether one of the players was the constable or bandit. If neither It would mostly be a scripted event and have a most likely outcome if the players leave it to run its course and dont interfere.

Though given its meant to be an opposed check I would think its likely that both sides roll their respective dice, the Constable on Guile and the Bandit on Intuition, and the number of successes for either side moving a tally slider in favor of the Constable or Bandit.

Should the bandit hit their predetermined point they will find a way to escape (the bandits most likely choice in this case) or the constable conceededs and leaves the vicinity to let the bandit get away. basically whatever the most apropiate situation that can or would occur after all factor are considered but the result being in the bandits favour

While if the Constable reaches their predetermined level they are able to talk the bandit out and letting the hostage free.

Should the constable accumilate a set number of miss fortune though the bandit will kill the Hostage, likewise if the bandit accumilates enough miss fortune, the bandti exposes himself to be shot by the constable (or some other bad occurance happens to the bandit).

You could allow or add some fortune results to this as well.

Basically a visual rep is something like this:

Bandit win <-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-0-1-2-3-4-5-> Constable win

0 = starting point, (I gave the constable less needed 'successes' as they are in the better position)

Bandit Missfortune = 5
Constable Missfortune = 5
(the missfortune being the number that a missfortune hapens)

Any number of other factors could move the 'slider' tally of course not just the guile check, it simply represents who the situation favors the most at that point in time.

Hrm... this brought up questions I hadn't asked. I assumed that, in an opposed test, both would roll 'positive' dice. The roll would be made, negative modifiers would cancel out things as usual, then the resulting successes of the two would cancel each other out.

The answer I thought I was looking for was:


Constable: 1 green (Conservative), 2 blue (Characteristic), 1 yellow (Trained), 1 black (Misfortune)

-vs-

Bandit: 1 red (Recklace), 2 blue (Characteristic)

My thougth was that, after the constable rolled, say he had 2 successes. Then the bandit would roll. If he had, say, 1 success, that would result in a net total of 1 success for the constable.

I think I was making a few assumptions here that may or may not have been correct. Perhaps it is a little early for this excercise :/

I had a few scenarios too :( Perhaps we'll pick this thread back up when I know more. It just seemed like the correct, the intuitive way to do it. I'm curious now, how far off I am.

Its rather unknown how an opposed check will work unfortunatly, whether it adds to the difficuilty of the one preforming the action, or like you described both sides roll their respective dice factors (which im assuming is the case at this point).

I can tell you that an opposed check does not have both sides "rolling off" with their own sets of dice.

This sort of "roll off" ends up creating a false positive situation with regards to resolution: If someone generates at least 1 net success, the core mechanic states they succeed at their task. However, if both sides generate 1 net success, both can't succeed if they're after different goals, so this method does not support the core mechanic.

Opposed checks support the core mechanic, rather than use a special exception.

I have a sneaking feeling there'll be more information about this at some point in the future...

Couldn't you save yourself extra math by cancelling out a reckless and conservative die and stick with the normal roll?

Jay H

Just roleplay it.

As the GM, I know the NPC. The player can roleplay trying to convince the NPC, and I'll make a judgement on that basis. If the PC has some quirks that suggest he's likely to be more or less convincing than the player then I'll take that into account. If I really can't decide one way or the other, I'll roll a die (a D6 will do) to decide which direction I'll take the NPC, but it's really too exciting a situation to let it get bogged down with messing about rules mechanisms.

Cheers

Sparrow

James Sparrow said:

...but it's really too exciting a situation to let it get bogged down with messing about rules mechanisms.

IME, it's not very hard for a moderately experienced gamer to roleplay and also use mechanics at the same time.

Herr Arnulfe said:

James Sparrow said:

...but it's really too exciting a situation to let it get bogged down with messing about rules mechanisms.

IME, it's not very hard for a moderately experienced gamer to roleplay and also use mechanics at the same time.

Very true. However, in my experience, even a relatively inexperienced gamer can roleplay and resolve many situations without using mechanics at all.

Cheers

Sparrow

Or you roleplay it ant then use your judgement on how the player is doing to add further fortune/misfortune dice.

btw - assuming the player is the constable I would use the Bandit's Int or WP to decide the challenge dice for the Guile test. If the player is the Bandit, I'd just roleplay it as for me it's important that the player's hand isn't forced by the dice.

James Sparrow said:

Very true. However, in my experience, even a relatively inexperienced gamer can roleplay and resolve many situations without using mechanics at all.

Inexperienced gamers may struggle to manage both rules and roleplaying at the same time, but for people still learning how to RP, I find that gamist elements give them something to do and prevent them from feeling like a wallflower. Heck, even some veteran RPGers aren't great roleplayers, preferring to hang out and just strategise, metagame and roll dice instead. Even experienced gamers who are good roleplayers sometimes have off days when they're not feeling as creative and would prefer to just roll some dice than force the creativity.

I think my GM would go for roleplaying rather than dice rolling.

Silent Star said:

I think my GM would go for roleplaying rather than dice rolling.

WFRP 3 is a Roleplaying game?

More like ROLLplaying game.

Amirite? Eh? Eh guys?

Well, I think the intent of the OP (at least from my understanding) was figuring out the dice pool for a situation. Certainly, this could be roleplayed out instead of left to dice rolls. However, if you *were* to make a dice pool for this event, what would it be?

I do like the idea of using the track someone mentioned ealier. Stick the marker at "0", representing the state of the bandit. Give the constable (or group) a few rolls. Extra successes (or boons?) increase the track, and failures/banes decrease the track. If the bandit's track gets +- 3 it's over, either the bandit surrenders (+3) or the bandit tries to flee/attacks (-3).

Ok. Let's see.

I've been rereading the various diaries (especially the combat ones), and I think I understand/can guess how opposed rolls work.

Now, if I've understood combat correctly, you roll:
- Characteristic (-Stance dice)
- Stance dice
- Challenge dice (normally* 1 in combat)
- Misfortune dice = target's Defence

* It'll depend on circumstances. If I'm hanging out of a window by my toes trying to shoot the wings off a fly, I'd expect there to be an extra Challenge dice or two, as well as Misfortune dice.

So, back to our Bandit / Constable hostage situation. It's all going to depend on who our active character is, as they'll be the ones doing the rolling.

Let's assume that it's the Constable.

Our valiant Constable plans to use honeyed words to sway the Bandit.

His dice pool would be:
- 2 Characteristic dice (one less due to the 1-step Conservative Stance)
- 1 Conservative die (as he has to swap out Characteristic dice=Stance)
- 1 Expertise die (for having the Guile skill)
- 1 Challenge die (assuming it's "easy")
- 1 Misfortune die (as the Bandit is edgy)
- 0-3 Misfortune dice (depending on the Bandit's "Defence"*)

* This is where I'm not sure. We just don't yet know exactly how it is calculated.

It could be that you add Misfortune dice equal to the Characteristic (3), or maybe you only add them if the Bandit was skilled in Intuition. My feeling (from looking at the Defence ratings from the Bestiary PDF) is that you should only be looking to add a small handful of Misfortune dice (0-5), rather than anything more serious.

Now, a quick 10 or so rolls using Sunatet's most excellent dice roller seems to give our Constable success about 2/3rds of the time.

Assuming success, he's part way there! If he's really lucky, and nets a 2-point Boon, he'll have an extra Fortune die on talking the Bandit down (due to Honey Words' handy boon ability).

Does that seem about right?

Katzenhandler,

I read this post, and the other one you made speculating about how opposed tests work. Nice work! I think you're as close as anyone right now to understanding it. Thanks for the input.

Yes, Katz, except ...

It is an opposed test. Somewhere in the equation the Bandit's Int and Intuition skill (if he had it trained) need to be taken into account. How they are taken into account, though, is somewhat of a mystery. It's some sort of additional challenge dice or misfortune dice, I expect. How many, and which is the question. It might be misfortune for characteristic and challenge for skill, or vice versa, or just misfortune for all and a GM-set challenge dice difficulty. So yeah, I think we're close to correct. I have a feeling there will be Combat 103 diary which will explain opposed tests and more combat 'guts' like damage in a bit more depth.

Necrozius said:

Silent Star said:

I think my GM would go for roleplaying rather than dice rolling.

WFRP 3 is a Roleplaying game?

More like ROLLplaying game.

Amirite? Eh? Eh guys?

your wrong...its still very much a social game...what you say and do has an effect on what you role....yeah....no its ROLEplay

Farin said:

Necrozius said:

Silent Star said:

I think my GM would go for roleplaying rather than dice rolling.

WFRP 3 is a Roleplaying game?

More like ROLLplaying game.

Amirite? Eh? Eh guys?

your wrong...its still very much a social game...what you say and do has an effect on what you role....yeah....no its ROLEplay

I beleive our friend Necrozius was speaking as a joke. And a game being ROLL play of ROLE play is entirely up to the players, not the mechanics.

I'm rather concerned if an opposed check adds misfortune dice, especially given some actions inherintly have missfortune dice.

Take Backstab as an example it has 3 inherent misfortune dice and will likely add 2 or more for the Targets Observation(int), thats a woping sorpresa.gif 5+ missfortune dice before any situational ones are added. Or any other dice for that matter too.

Peacekeeper_b said:

I beleive our friend Necrozius was speaking as a joke. And a game being ROLL play of ROLE play is entirely up to the players, not the mechanics.

I couldn't agree more.

As soon as a mechanic slows down a scene, I stop using it and let it play out more naturally (narratively).

Peacekeeper_b said:

I beleive our friend Necrozius was speaking as a joke. And a game being ROLL play of ROLE play is entirely up to the players, not the mechanics.

i couldnt agree more! im working with my power gaming guess to make them roleplay