I'm all for house rules, but are you concerned with bending the success rate up and any impact on challenge level?

The dice are set up the way they are for a wash to be a failure. Given the dice are weighted to success if you move the border, as it were, for what equals failure and have a re-roll, you've bent that curve more towards success on a given check.

As I've stated several times, this is not a re-roll on the same action. It is the opportunity to make a second attempt on a later action. This house rule provides no benefit to combat checks because you can attack every round already.

I get the whole second action thing but at the end of the day it's still two attempts on the same check. It still bends to success curve up on a single check. Whether it occurs over two actions isn't really relevant, particularly in non structured game play as actions are essentially irrelevant in non structured play.

If it is a wash...

...I stab them with a harpoon.

Blast you that Samophlange! It will always be "too soon"!

Even with funny dice, sometimes a miss really is just a miss...

By the rules though no uncancelled successes left equals a failure. A wash is a failure per RAW.

Yes, and I acknowledged that in my initial post. This is a house rule. House rules are inherently not RAW.

I've played this game long enough now to recognize that a wash, especially a complete wash without even threat or advantage, is a narrative let-down to everyone at the table, GM and players alike. I can feel the excitement that accompanies any roll, however faint, merely dissipate in a puff of indifference and/or frustration. The narrative stalls in the face of a wash, which just isn't fun, at least for my table, so thus the house rule.

Your mileage may differ, but to each their own.

So would you do the same for 1 succes and 2 failure with no advantage or threat? The result is in fact exactly the same, but in that scenario I bet you don't feel the need to make something happen, am I right?

1 success and 2 failures at least gives you a visible failure and leaves everyone feeling comfortable knowing that it's a failure. Even 1 result of any kind feels like a solid result. A wash counts as a failure but just feels inconclusive. I understand that it works for you, but it's left my players and I feeling let down.

Well I guess it is a visual thing indeed... I am not saying you are wrong or are having "bad fun" at all but I am just trying to find out what it is that make people feel this way.

In fact the way Cuddly sets up his houserule for instance seems (to me) a way of having something good happen when you fail which is what advantage is for, for instance.

What I usually think is that a situation in itself is a failure and you have to succeed at a task in order to obtain a succes. No succes means just that.

Anyway, wasn't trying to be a smart ass but it seems people are overthinking this in a way that (again to me) seems silly.

I'm all for house rules, but are you concerned with bending the success rate up and any impact on challenge level?

The dice are set up the way they are for a wash to be a failure. Given the dice are weighted to success if you move the border, as it were, for what equals failure and have a re-roll, you've bent that curve more towards success on a given check.

As I've stated several times, this is not a re-roll on the same action. It is the opportunity to make a second attempt on a later action. This house rule provides no benefit to combat checks because you can attack every round already.

To me this seems like a thing that would happen with advantage and not even with one or two advantage but three rolled advantage at least...

Even with funny dice, sometimes a miss really is just a miss...

And even then, it can have an interesting narrative spin if the GM is willing to put a little effort into it.

I agree with 2P51 that allowing a re-roll is pushing the curve more towards being successful. And as another posted noted, there are plenty of RPGs where failure is simply failure and the game moves on, yet somehow in this system the occasional simple failure does come up and it's treated as some big deal. I think it's rather telling that in a session I watched being run by Jay Little (the guy that came up with this system) some years back, he simply shrugged his shoulders at a wash-out roll made by one of the PCs that was outside of combat and simply carried on with the scenario, effectively saying "yeah, it's a boring result but it happens" and getting back to the narrative.

rerolling the wash is a recipy for a bad movie.

Why bother rolling dice at all if you're just going to override the result and roll until you get something you want?

Even with funny dice, sometimes a miss really is just a miss...

And even then, it can have an interesting narrative spin if the GM is willing to put a little effort into it.

I agree with 2P51 that allowing a re-roll is pushing the curve more towards being successful. And as another posted noted, there are plenty of RPGs where failure is simply failure and the game moves on, yet somehow in this system the occasional simple failure does come up and it's treated as some big deal. I think it's rather telling that in a session I watched being run by Jay Little (the guy that came up with this system) some years back, he simply shrugged his shoulders at a wash-out roll made by one of the PCs that was outside of combat and simply carried on with the scenario, effectively saying "yeah, it's a boring result but it happens" and getting back to the narrative.

I'm never one to avoid house rules it's just I find the issue interesting. The success curve does get bent more positive, but it's the underlying reasoning I'm just not understanding of why a wash leaves anyone uncomfortable and yet 1 failure showing is ok.

The dice have make believe symbols on their faces and those values are assigned by the RAW. The probabilities and how the dice are laid out and printed go hand in hand with one another. I guess I just don't understand the discomfort or need, it's like being uncomfortable with the letter B but ok with the letter C, while ignoring grammar completely.

An earlier poster stated it perfectly I guess when he said "It's a visual thing"...

Men are very visual creatures and this sometimes means that "no picture left" gets mistaken for "nothing hapens"

If you look at what others have echoed in the conversation "no succes" is not a problem as long as there is a failure on the table and it is the lack of a visual aid showing the failure that makes a lot of people (read men) feel that something isn't right.

I have player that experienced this as well.

He rolled a 'wash' when shooting a gun and said;

"so, nothing happens?"

I told him, "Sure it did, you shot and missed"

"But I have nothing"

"Yeah, so you miss."

"But I have no failure."

"No, you have a failure."

"Not on the table."

"Did you have a nett succes?"

"No."

"So you failed."

"So maybe my gun didn't go off!"

"No, you... You know what? Sure!"

I will often described a flubbed attack roll that had no advantage or threat as some bit of the scenery getting demolished, such as blaster bolts leaving smoldering holes in the wall, or a vibro-ax cleaving a big ol' gouge in the floor. Or one mildly amusing incident from a recent FaD session of the Soresu Defender getting a wash on his Lightsaber check (second roll ever with his newly acquired lightsaber, with the first roll beheading the lead bounty hunter) as him getting a little over-excited and executing a flawless lightsaber training drill... while forgetting to account for needing to alter the stance in order to actually hit the target instead of weaving around them as was done back when he was a youngling at the Jedi Temple.

An earlier poster stated it perfectly I guess when he said "It's a visual thing"...

Men are very visual creatures and this sometimes means that "no picture left" gets mistaken for "nothing hapens"

If you look at what others have echoed in the conversation "no succes" is not a problem as long as there is a failure on the table and it is the lack of a visual aid showing the failure that makes a lot of people (read men) feel that something isn't right.

I have player that experienced this as well.

He rolled a 'wash' when shooting a gun and said;

"so, nothing happens?"

I told him, "Sure it did, you shot and missed"

"But I have nothing"

"Yeah, so you miss."

"But I have no failure."

"No, you have a failure."

"Not on the table."

"Did you have a nett succes?"

"No."

"So you failed."

"So maybe my gun didn't go off!"

"No, you... You know what? Sure!"

The majority of my play group are female and they all feel the same way.

Also this thread has had 4-5 people say: "If you re-roll what's the point of rolling at all". Yeah, that's why I started this thread, so please talk, give ideas, suggestions, whatever.

If the roll is a complete push, I would just let it go. Not every single roll in this game has to be epic and memorable. Sometimes the shot just goes wide over their head off into empty space.

I will say I've contemplated, as a house rule for "overly dramatic play," that any roll that turns up a wash is to be rerolled, with an upgrade for both the skill and the difficulty (so as to increase the chances of triumphs/despairs).

Obviously, I don't think I would ever actually call for this rule in my game, but its at least funny to consider.

What to do if the roll is a wash?

Stop rolling dice in the bathtub?

If you're really hell-bent on letting a PC do a re-roll of a non-combat skill check if everything cancels out, then have them flip a Destiny Point for the privilege. And if they already spent a Destiny Point to upgrade their check, then too bad.

That the game includes talents whose sole purpose is to allow a single re-roll of one or two specific skill with a "once per session" restriction, and most of these talents are in the 4th or 5th row of a specialization, should be a strong indicator of just how good the potential of a re-roll is in this system.

Also this thread has had 4-5 people say: "If you re-roll what's the point of rolling at all". Yeah, that's why I started this thread, so please talk, give ideas, suggestions, whatever.

Well, basically people are giving you the advise of treating it for what it is. A failure.

Missed/failures are a huge part of RPGs no need to feel bad about them.

An earlier poster stated it perfectly I guess when he said "It's a visual thing"...

Men are very visual creatures and this sometimes means that "no picture left" gets mistaken for "nothing hapens"

If you look at what others have echoed in the conversation "no succes" is not a problem as long as there is a failure on the table and it is the lack of a visual aid showing the failure that makes a lot of people (read men) feel that something isn't right.

I have player that experienced this as well.

He rolled a 'wash' when shooting a gun and said;

"so, nothing happens?"

I told him, "Sure it did, you shot and missed"

"But I have nothing"

"Yeah, so you miss."

"But I have no failure."

"No, you have a failure."

"Not on the table."

"Did you have a nett succes?"

"No."

"So you failed."

"So maybe my gun didn't go off!"

"No, you... You know what? Sure!"

The majority of my play group are female and they all feel the same way.

Side stepping gender stereotypes and what not my post did contain quite a bit more than just that...

Is it the visual thing because what might help in some cases is not having them roll to see what happens but having them roll to succeed.

Also, the majority of your group are women? That must be so refreshing!!

An earlier poster stated it perfectly I guess when he said "It's a visual thing"...

Men are very visual creatures and this sometimes means that "no picture left" gets mistaken for "nothing hapens"

If you look at what others have echoed in the conversation "no succes" is not a problem as long as there is a failure on the table and it is the lack of a visual aid showing the failure that makes a lot of people (read men) feel that something isn't right.

I have player that experienced this as well.

He rolled a 'wash' when shooting a gun and said;

"so, nothing happens?"

I told him, "Sure it did, you shot and missed"

"But I have nothing"

"Yeah, so you miss."

"But I have no failure."

"No, you have a failure."

"Not on the table."

"Did you have a nett succes?"

"No."

"So you failed."

"So maybe my gun didn't go off!"

"No, you... You know what? Sure!"

The majority of my play group are female and they all feel the same way.

Side stepping gender stereotypes and what not my post did contain quite a bit more than just that...

Is it the visual thing because what might help in some cases is not having them roll to see what happens but having them roll to succeed.

Also, the majority of your group are women? That must be so refreshing!!

Yeah, your post does contain a lot of story, thanks!

And yeah, one player is my fiancé who plays a bubblegum pink Twi'lek who uses huge guns. She's a heavy gunner. The other players are a couple of our friends who are married. He plays a human politico/force sensitive exile, she plays a Bothan pilot.

I usually deal with failure/wash like a small despair. You might succeded, but something bad happens or you done it very poorly.

(Kevin Spacey asking "But why?")

(Kevin Spacey asking "But why?")

Because they like to accommodate pc's to the extreme. I've seen this guy on d20 radio Facebook page creating several threads where he asked if it's OK to allow players to re roll failed rolls, lower difficulties of said rolls etc( BEFORE even gm'ing the system for the first time ). As a player in such game I would feel exactly zero sense of accomplishment as I can't fail. Less of a game now, more of a bad movie. ALL HAIL NARRATIVE.

I don't know about any of that, I am not at their table and I haven't read the FB posts so I am not comfortable making any judgement about his/her game and for all I know it is a blast...

But making a plain failure into a succes with a despair when neither was rolled seems so contradictory to the system that I am a bit dumbfounded.