with the general opportunity spendings, you can "establish" stuff, ie: with water you can "establish" a piece of terrain.

anybody have an idea how that is suppose to play out ?the player basically says "ok, this terrain is now entangling, GM do you agree?"

this seems nut to me and will often end up in debates around the table if the GM should or should not allow it.

and the fire example "notice the absence of shoes at the door meaning nobody is home", like... a player can establish that? totally doesn't make sense to me.

and air... establish a detail on an npc. like... what ? "mr.GM, that NPC is missing an arm, do you agree?" this will never end....

sure. the earth and void ones make sense that the player can invent something, but air, water and fire.. feels like it should be the GM who gives an extra info to the player (about the terrain, about a detail on an npc, about a something missing or off)

opinions ?

edit: my opinion here is that you can establish anything if it isnt related to Gm's stuff (terrain, npcs etc). so its not like i am inflexible as i would TOTALLY allow an earth opportunity so the player take out his rope that he never had originally because it would have made sense for the charact3er to have had a rope in the situation.

but when it comes down to "establish a fact about an NPC or a terrain" I feel this is a bit going into dangerous territories of long debates around the table.

I understand where you are coming from here but I might have an explanation that works for you. I think that if you interpret it as Rules as Written (RAW) it is confusing but if you go for the Intent you can work it quite easily.

So, for example, "establish" becomes a working out between the player and the GM.

"Ok so I have two opportunities results and I am using water stance, so can I look at the terrain and see if there are any tree roots or uneven terrain or similar that I could drive my opponent into so they trip? "

Which is the same situation you gave above but done differently and still fits the "establish" keyword.

For fire:

"As I am using the fire approach and have X opportunity results on my investigation check can I establish if there are any signs that may indicate .........

For Air:

"Due to my air approach do I notice anything about the NPC, does he have a tell, a limp, favour a specific technique etc.

I am hoping that my rambling above might have helped a little bit. If not hopefully I have not go too far off in the wrong direction.

42 minutes ago, Tankboy_007 said:

I understand where you are coming from here but I might have an explanation that works for you. I think that if you interpret it as Rules as Written (RAW) it is confusing but if you go for the Intent you can work it quite easily.

So, for example, "establish" becomes a working out between the player and the GM.

"Ok so I have two opportunities results and I am using water stance, so can I look at the terrain and see if there are any tree roots or uneven terrain or similar that I could drive my opponent into so they trip? "

Which is the same situation you gave above but done differently and still fits the "establish" keyword.

For fire:

"As I am using the fire approach and have X opportunity results on my investigation check can I establish if there are any signs that may indicate .........

For Air:

"Due to my air approach do I notice anything about the NPC, does he have a tell, a limp, favour a specific technique etc.

I am hoping that my rambling above might have helped a little bit. If not hopefully I have not go too far off in the wrong direction.

yup, that works if your players are really nice and not powergamers.

and sure, the GM always have the final say. I just feel that in game, this can get pretty weird with the players trying to convince the GM.

but sure. what you say is logical and i understand it.

Edit:

the whole topic is also because I read something that Katrina Ostrander posted on Twitter:

I tried a new thing in my # L5RRPG games at @ acadecon this weekend--I let my players spend their Opportunity results to ask questions related to their checks. It ended up being a good halfway point between players adding their own narrative details and the GM providing clues.

I think I kind of prefer her own take on it.

Her way is easier to run because its basically doesn't put any pressure on the GM to accept anything while still allowing the players to "incite" stuff.

as you can see, I am really trying to figure out this game. because I think it is a diamond in the rough. It feels a bit unpolished and unfinished, but its got really good base.

3 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

... I feel this is a bit going into dangerous territories of long debates around the table.

Players and GM are supposed to collaborate to forge a narrative. That's just how it is. I get where you're coming from and it's probably not for everyone, but it is what it is. I've also seen the opposite approach be a problem, particularly in superhero-type RPGs: the rules supposedly strictly define what can or can't be done, so the powergamers run away with any big option they find and the whole thing just devolves into an arms race between players and GM. RPGs just work better when everybody involved tries to make it a good game, rather than a pissing contest where the object of the game is to one-up one another.

1 minute ago, nameless ronin said:

Players and GM are supposed to collaborate to forge a narrative. That's just how it is. I get where you're coming from and it's probably not for everyone, but it is what it is. I've also seen the opposite approach be a problem, particularly in superhero-type RPGs: the rules supposedly strictly define what can or can't be done, so the powergamers run away with any big option they find and the whole thing just devolves into an arms race between players and GM. RPGs just work better when everybody involved tries to make it a good game, rather than a pissing contest where the object of the game is to one-up one another.

definitely. i am very willing to let the narrative play out and influence the game. i am a roleplayer after all.

doesn't mean that i won't raise an eye brow at some stuff. i'm already "cutting" a lot of mechanical things because i find they bog down the game. (removed all of p.329 opp spending, rather use the narrative/descriptor and general opp spending. I find it is easier to manage and flows better and make the narrative supersede the mechanical effects).

all in all, i'm just discussing and getting various opinions. it isnt a me versus anybody. i'm just trying to figure out how i want to play the game and i want things to be clear.

like i said before, i'd rather have a vague rule (like on p.28, spending opportunity for narrative tool or as descriptor) rather than dozen of mechanical options like "if you roll a Trade Fire skill you can use an opportunity to add a kept dice set on an opportunity to your next skill check you make before the end of the session".

and after reading the twitter from Katrina I tried to see what was the opinion of people.

Table 8-1 (p. 328-329) is just a list of examples of ways to spend opportunities. It's not separate from p. 28, it's the exact same thing just made explicit. It's important that it exists, because p. 28 alone is so vague a lot of groups - particularly ones that are new to roleplaying in general or at least to narrative ones - will be very confused about how that's supposed to work. I don't necessarily like every example given, but they do help players and GMs understand approaches better.

9 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

Table 8-1 (p. 328-329) is just a list of examples of ways to spend opportunities. It's not separate from p. 28, it's the exact same thing just made explicit. It's important that it exists, because p. 28 alone is so vague a lot of groups - particularly ones that are new to roleplaying in general or at least to narrative ones - will be very confused about how that's supposed to work. I don't necessarily like every example given, but they do help players and GMs understand approaches better.

yeah, there is a sidebar saying these are just "examples".

personally i'm taking p.328 as rigid options that a player can always take (sort of a free mechanical options if you don't feel like thinking too much) and i'm removing p.329 in favor of "discuss with your GM to make something cool narratively/description (p.28) and maybe the GM will give you a mechanical boost". but i don't want p.329 to become more options that are always valid for the players as i find it becomes too tedious and bog down the flow of the game with uninteresting searching thru tables each time a player make a roll.

basically, i'd rather reward players that have a good imagination/roleplay than a player who game the system with mechanical opp spendings like on p.329.

again, this is just my way of running my game, and there are probably dozen different ways.

1 minute ago, Avatar111 said:

yeah, there is a sidebar saying these are just "examples".

personally i'm taking p.328 as rigid options that a player can always take, and i'm removing p.329 in favor of "discuss with your GM to make something cool narratively/description and maybe the GM will give you a mechanical boost". but i don't want p.329 to become options that are always valid for the players as i find it becomes too tedious and bog down the flow of the game with uninteresting searching thru tables each time a player make a roll.

again, this is just my way of running my game, and there are probably dozen different ways.

Every group should try to find what works best for them. You'll be better off doing things your way. This particular issue feels like another case of bad editing to me: if the examples weren't shunted off to an appendix and formatted in a table, but rather listed as normal text on page 28-29 where people are reading about what to do with opportunities it'd have given a much more open and organic impression than it does now.

Bad editing?

Like when they mention you can spend opportunities to draw a weapon during the initiative (conflict rules) and then tell you to go check page 328.

Thing is, drawing a weapon during initiative is kind of a big deal.

And they mention you can do it, but then it isnt in the examples.

So, what stance can i do that with? Any?

Lol

tdlr; i understand what you meant!

29 minutes ago, Avatar111 said:

So, what stance can i do that with? Any?

Actually, yes - according to p. 250 a character can use any ring (not stance, they'll go into the corresponding stance after initiative is resolved) for their initiative check during a conflict scene. Hope that helps!

20 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

Actually, yes - according to p. 250 a character can use any ring (not stance, they'll go into the corresponding stance after initiative is resolved) for their initiative check during a conflict scene. Hope that helps!

I know that, what I meant is that in the conflict initiative rules, they mention you can spend opportunity on initiative check, for, example "draw a weapon".

Then they refer to page 328 for examples.

But... Nowhere in the examples it mentions that you can spend opportunity to draw a weapon during initiative check.

So my question was: how does that work? Do i need to roll initiative using a specific ring? How many opportunity i need to spend?

It is all up in the air.. it is honestly probably just bad editing and they forgot to remove that exam ple from their conflict initiative rule.

but who knows!

3 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

I know that, what I meant is that in the conflict initiative rules, they mention you can spend opportunity on initiative check, for, example "draw a weapon".

Then they refer to page 328 for examples.

But... Nowhere in the examples it mentions that you can spend opportunity to draw a weapon during initiative check.

So my question was: how does that work? Do i need to roll initiative using a specific ring? How many opportunity i need to spend?

It is all up in the air.. it is honestly probably just bad editing and they forgot to remove that exam ple from their conflict initiative rule.

but who knows!

Yeah. Bad editing. That was in beta. I think it was removed to make iaijutsu techniques a bit more meaningful for round one of a conflict.

30 minutes ago, Shosur0 said:

Yeah. Bad editing. That was in beta. I think it was removed to make iaijutsu techniques a bit more meaningful for round one of a conflict.

To be fair, it was even worse in the Beta; you had 'draw a weapon' as a * generic opportunity or as a ** opportunity attached to the Iaijutsu technique (allowing you to draw a second, weapon, obviously - the basic 'draw a blade' was included)

7 hours ago, Tankboy_007 said:

So, for example, "establish" becomes a working out between the player and the GM.

"Ok so I have two opportunities results and I am using water stance, so can I look at the terrain and see if there are any tree roots or uneven terrain or similar that I could drive my opponent into so they trip? "

Which is the same situation you gave above but done differently and still fits the "establish" keyword.

For fire:

"As I am using the fire approach and have X opportunity results on my investigation check can I establish if there are any signs that may indicate .........

For Air:

"Due to my air approach do I notice anything about the NPC, does he have a tell, a limp, favour a specific technique etc.

I am hoping that my rambling above might have helped a little bit. If not hopefully I have not go too far off in the wrong direction.

This. We've always used 'change the environment' spends not to spontaneously turn things into woodland or to have a guy's arm disappear but so that 'plot-critical' details can be added during a fight - the equivalent of an Errol Flynn-esque " look, a chandelier rope!" (dramatically swings across to opposite balcony).

The one that springs to mind was in a fight in a teahouse; a Crane courtier who was not exactly very gifted with a sword and trying to protect the family who ran the place from pirates used an opportunity to notice a big jug of water and the fire for heating the water - neither is exactly out of character for being in a tea house's kitchen but neither had been described at that point - and lobbed the one into the other, producing a big cloud of smoke and steam he used as cover to get the kitchen staff out the back.

It's for anything that could and should realistically be there that can be useful with a bit of creativity. Like you say, it's not a great option for powergamers, but for narrative games it saves having to have a lot of book-keeping; if you try and be ludicrously strict with a game then what is listed is all that is ever in the environment, which means you need to go to nth degree of detail on the off chance something is relevant several sessions down the line.

The Earth opportunity - where you happened to 'retroactively pack something in advance' - is a good example. If you've explicitely stated that you don't have item X, then you don't have it. The opportunity spend isn't magic. But if it's not been said one way or another, there's no reason a samurai on the road shouldn't have a flint and some firelighters about their person somewhere.

We also do these Opp spendings by applying a "narrative no-go" restriction so you can't go against something that was specifically established earlier but you can change it within the limits of the narrative. For example, you can turn a room into Dangerous Terrain by making your opponent accidentally kick up a brazier or say that the room is now Entangling Terrain because it is very densely furbished and the furniture is in the way.

Tho the group favorit currently is the "missing item" Fire Opp when NPCs leave their most potent weapons behind because they did not expect serious confrontation or having that one poor shuggie leave that very important scroll back in the shrine where one of the PCs are praying.

3 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

We also do these Opp spendings by applying a "narrative no-go" restriction so you can't go against something that was specifically established earlier but you can change it within the limits of the narrative. For example, you can turn a room into Dangerous Terrain by making your opponent accidentally kick up a brazier or say that the room is now Entangling Terrain because it is very densely furbished and the furniture is in the way.

Tho the group favorit currently is the "missing item" Fire Opp when NPCs leave their most potent weapons behind because they did not expect serious confrontation or having that one poor shuggie leave that very important scroll back in the shrine where one of the PCs are praying.

And if they start to use that fire opp too much, or everytime. So that it basically becomes "an ability". As a GM, what will you do?

4 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

when N PCs leave their most potent weapons behind because they did not expect serious confrontation or having that one poor shuggie leave that very important scroll back in the shrine where one of the PCs are praying.

Oh look, it's me.

7 minutes ago, Avatar111 said:

And if they start to use that fire opp too much, or everytime. So that it basically becomes "an ability". As a GM, what will you do?

Mind my descriptions, obviously .