I have not play tested yet, but the reading of the rules gives me a an impression that I also had back in the days of the second edition of the game under AEG. That the characters have very limited success chances at any given task with beginning characters at the start of the game. Are my fears justified? I mean especially with how easy it seems that a katana can get damaged or even destroyed.

Sure, we get now more points on various rings then we got under AEG, but the rings start lower too. And aside from school skills we get almost nothing to customise our characters more in that regard (no free starting points). Will this be an issue?

I can't say yes or no for sure, because I'm only just starting to test rolling - but this is one of the things I'm most concerned about. I've played Arkham Horror board game where we rolled multiple 6 sided dice. A result of 4-6 was a success, while a 1-3 was failure (I was blessed.) I remember it very clearly in my mind... I rolled 8 dice with 2 re-rolls, and I got just 1 success... Random things happen, and these dice are like flipping coins.

Unfortunately this is the trend with "narrative dice." I think the goal is that your scenarios are not so dependent on success and failure, as they are on determining if the characters got the "advantage path" or "challenging path." Such as - a group of PC enter the room of the Imperial Scribe, they are trying to find a schedule written by the scribe so they can ambush their enemy. While searching they fail the roll, but with opportunity they create a locked box. The scroll must be in there! Now if they can just get it open... and they hear foot steps approaching. NO TIME! Take it with you, open it later. So they have still succeeded... in a way... but they have taken a whole box, the paper isn't "certainly" found yet, and the box missing will be noticed.

I'm game for writing my stories that way, I've heard some good ideas for interpreting opportunities. I'm a bit scared that 1 bad combat roll could kill them quicker than 1st ed lol.

I made 60 test rolls in Tabletop Simulator with 2 Ring Dice and 1 Skill Die and I got at least 2 Successes about 2/3 of the time.

33 minutes ago, ElTacolad said:

I made 60 test rolls in Tabletop Simulator with 2 Ring Dice and 1 Skill Die and I got at least 2 Successes about 2/3 of the time.

Okay, that sounds solid. And I glad you took that amount of dice to test it, since I think that is probably the average that most dice pools will look like for starting characters.

Nevertheless I wonder if Dojo could make a comeback to bring maybe a few more skill points for starting characters.

It will come down to players and GM's getting their eyes in for checks. As GM my goal is to have the players succeed most of the time, but at a cost. In this system that means them needing to suffer Strife in order to succeed.

1 Ring vs TN 1 has a 50% chance of success, not horrible and comparable to most other settings beginner characters. But add a single rank of Skill, or a second Ring and that goes up to 75% or more. Then add the Exploding option which increases the number of dice you keep as well.

The difference with a system like this is that at the table you cannot quickly calculate chances of success. More ring than TN and success is more likely. More Skill die reduce your chances of Strife.

6 hours ago, ElTacolad said:

I made 60 test rolls in Tabletop Simulator with 2 Ring Dice and 1 Skill Die and I got at least 2 Successes about 2/3 of the time.

Because Statistics ahoy!

A Ring Die has 3 success faces on 6 total faces including 1 explosive success.

Assuming the die is kept and any explosive results are rolled out, it tends to the following:

• 0.6 successes
• 0.6 strife
• 0.4 opportunity (firstly it's a lower probability of rolling one, but also any opportunity result cannot explode further)

A Skill Die has 7 success faces on 12 total faces including 2 explosive success.

Assuming the die is kept and any explosive results are rolled out, it tends to the following:

• 0.7 successes
• 0.3 strife
• 0.3 opportunity (yes, skill dice are on average worse at generating non-success-specific benefits than ring dice).

if you're rolling 1 skill and 2 ring, failing a TN2 check needs you to either roll:

• No successes at all on the three dice - about a 10% chance
• 1 success that is not an exploding success - about a 24% chance
• 1 exploding success that doesn't produce another success - about a 5% chance

So if I've got the number right (no garuantee!) then you've got about a 60% chance of bagging 2 successes.

Thanks. solid numbers. Can you tell how rings and skill scales? lets say how much better is a Ring 3 Skill 3 (Capable in ring and professionaly skilled, by the fluff) compared to a ring 2 skill 1.

A lot better!

14 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

Assuming the die is kept and any explosive results are rolled out, it tends to the following:

• 0.7 successes
• 0.3 strife
• 0.3 opportunity (yes, skill dice are on average worse at generating non-success-specific benefits than ring dice).

One side of the Skill die has both a Success and an Opportunity on it so you messed up the math.

2/12 sides are blank.

3/12 sides have only Opportunity

1/12 side have Success + Opportunity

2/12 sides have only Success

2/12 sides have Success + Strife

1/12 sides has Explosion

1/12 sides has Explosion + Strife

Discounting the bonus roll from Explosions

7/12 (58%) chance of getting any Success

3/12 (25%) chance of getting a Strife

4/12 (33%) chance of getting an Opportunity