Hi all,

I started running the Topaz Championship scenario from the beginner game tonight, but using PCs that the players had made themselves, and hit a few snags.

The thing that really struck me is that I can't find any guidance in the core rulebook about adjusting check difficulties based on PCs actions.

Obviously I can see the TN table, but is adjusting the TN the usual response for the PC trying to leverage a situational advantage in a check?

There is lots of information about modifying dice, but focused on the PCs advantages and disadvantages on the character sheet. I can't find anything situational.

I guess what im asking is: if a PC is attempting a check, and finds a clever way to improve their likelyhood of success, what options is it best to apply as a GM?

Should I adjust the TN?

Allow them to reroll dice as if they had a relevant distinction? (Change the number of dice they can reroll depending on circumstance)?

Allow them to roll additional dice? (Ring or skill dice?)

Allow them to keep additional dice?

Allow them to place a dice with a specific result?

Something else?

What are the advantages and disadvantages of these approaches? What potholes do I need to look out for if I start tinkering in this way?

Thanks all.

Given that advantages/disadvantages tie into the narrative mechanics of what is devised as a narrative RPG and situational stuff is not, I'm not entirely surprised the rules focus a lot more on the former than the latter.

Personally I use two options. If the task requiring the check remains essentially the same, I keep the TN as is and modify the dice pool as if assistance were given (usually 1 to 3 extra kept skill dice, depending on how helpful the circumstance is). If the task itself changes, I assign a new TN appropriate for that new task. I dislike modifying the pool with dice set to a specific result - you shouldn't get more opportunities from finding a way to turn situation to your advantage (it should be the other way around, opportunities let you alter the situation in a way that helps you) and if we're only considering adding successes that's really the same as reducing the TN; might as well just do that then.

Simple example - climbing a wall to enter a compound unnoticed might be a TN 3 Skullduggery check (I'll go into approaches with different TNs below); using a rope makes that substantially easier but you're still climbing that same wall, so I'd add 2 kept skill dice to the pool; using a ladder means you're no longer climbing a wall but a ladder, so that's another TN (probably TN 0, so an auto-success/no check needed).

More complicated example - convincing someone to do something for you might be a TN 3 (Fire 4, Air 2) Courtesy check (subject is very even-tempered, but also quite naive); showing them a forged piece that supports your made-up argument will help with the Air approach but not with the others, so if the Air approach is used I'd add a skill die to the pool while the pool stays the same for all other approaches; convincing them to help you but not necessarily by doing that specific thing (so basically hoping their help will be good enough regardless of what they choose to do) is not the same task but rather a similar and easier one, so I'd change the TN to 2 (Fire 3, Air 1).

tl;dr - if it makes accomplishing the task easier, add kept skill dice; if it changes the task to an easier one, reduce the TN; regardless of anything else, stay away from setting dice to a desired result

As an aside, the reverse can be done when the PCs try to sabotage someone else's efforts of course.

Although not directly helpful in terms of mechanics, if the PCs come up with a great idea or are doing great roleplaying for the scene (talking in character and all) I gladly lower the TN by 1, or consider the check passed without needing a roll- why complicate matters if the story is humming along and failure is uninteresting?

Note that lowering the TN is mechanically more advantageous than giving two bonus dice, which are better than a reroll of 2 dice.

Not because the odds are better, but because a TN reduction, unlike unkept dice or rerolls, but like a bonus kept die, provides more access to bonus successes AND is always going to work.

11 hours ago, Monkey Bloke said:

The thing that really struck me is that I can't find any guidance in the core rulebook about adjusting check difficulties based on PCs actions.

It is on page 296. Essentially, you can change the TN depending on the Approach being used. Since the Approach should reflect the PC's actions, this is a good place to start.

2 hours ago, AK_Aramis said:

Note that lowering the TN is mechanically more advantageous than giving two bonus dice, which are better than a reroll of 2 dice.

Not because the odds are better, but because a TN reduction, unlike unkept dice or rerolls, but like a bonus kept die, provides more access to bonus successes AND is always going to work.

Great point, and I should add that adjusting the TN or other mechanisms of GM trickery are mostly behind the screen. If you want to reward and encourage great roleplaying it might be better to give tangible advantages to PC rolls. Funny, because the biggest advantage you can give is less likely to be perceived as such! (unless you tell them of course)

4 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

It is on page 296. Essentially, you can change the TN depending on the Approach being used. Since the Approach should reflect the PC's actions, this is a good place to start.

I did read through this section, but it only discusses changing the TN based on approach.

I think @nameless ronin 's suggestions dovetail with what I was thinking. Thanks for the information.

14 hours ago, AK_Aramis said:

Note that lowering the TN is mechanically more advantageous than giving two bonus dice, which are better than a reroll of 2 dice.

Not because the odds are better, but because a TN reduction, unlike unkept dice or rerolls, but like a bonus kept die, provides more access to bonus successes AND is always going to work.

One of the big changes for Op spends from the beta. <OP>+: -1TN became <OP>: give assistance (if you failed) or <OP><OP>: give assistance if you succeed.

18 minutes ago, Hida Jitenno said:

One of the big changes for Op spends from the beta. <OP>+: -1TN became <OP>: give assistance (if you failed) or <OP><OP>: give assistance if you succeed.

Actually the assistance opp spends as described here were in the beta, I think. Now only the last one is presented on p. 328 (double opp to provide assistance). The single opp only lets you determine the easiest way to solve a problem.

Void opportunities still enable to drop the TN on a subsequent check by 1, though.

22 hours ago, Franwax said:

Actually the assistance opp spends as described here were in the beta, I think. Now only the last one is presented on p. 328 (double opp to provide assistance). The single opp only lets you determine the easiest way to solve a problem.

Void opportunities still enable to drop the TN on a subsequent check by 1, though.

Page 298 in the core book gives the single-if-fail, double-if-success rule for opps.

1 hour ago, Hida Jitenno said:

Page 298 in the core book gives the single-if-fail, double-if-success rule for opps.

Wow these things really are all over the place ! Looking at page 298, it does say that... referencing page 328, which does not have the one opp use :s

Anyway, it’s still cool to use it, I guess.

5 minutes ago, Franwax said:

Wow these things really are all over the place ! Looking at page 298, it does say that... referencing page 328, which does not have the one opp use :s

Anyway, it’s still cool to use it, I guess.

like when they mention that you can use opportunities in initiative to ready a weapon ?
yeah...
great RPG concept, but so unfinished/unpolished/unbalanced... a bit sad really... but hey, still a great game.

On 1/19/2019 at 5:19 AM, T_Kageyasu said:

Great point, and I should add that adjusting the TN or other mechanisms of GM trickery are mostly behind the screen. If you want to reward and encourage great roleplaying it might be better to give tangible advantages to PC rolls. Funny, because the biggest advantage you can give is less likely to be perceived as such! (unless you tell them of course)

Why do you keep them behind the shield? I don't... When something reduces the TN, I tell them.

I like the idea of giving an "assistance" dice (black or white) depending on situation/gear.

Like a +1 dice assistance if you have a medicine kit to heal a proper wound/condition.

Otherwise I'll probably stick with increasing/lowering TN or giving advantage/disadvantage, which is also a decent solution.

If somebody throws sand in your eyes, then you should be "blind" for a round. Stuff like that I guess.

Edit; those "blue" dice made everything easy lol.

11 hours ago, AK_Aramis said:

Why do you keep them behind the shield? I don't... When something reduces the TN,   I tell th  em   .

I should clarify that I might tell them that their course of action makes the task "easier", but not necessarily inform them of a specific numerical change to the TN. There's a lot of juggling going on even before a roll- determine base TN difficulty, adjust for roleplaying effort, adjust for approach, etc. and I have enough trouble not blurting out the TN before the approach is announced. It's not like in other games where you can easily handwave static bonuses or penalties to rolls.

I have been pondering giving "free raises" reminiscent of previous editions, which would translate into 1 kept opportunity result added to their check.

On 1/22/2019 at 12:33 AM, AK_Aramis said:

Why do you keep them behind the shield? I don't... When something reduces the TN, I tell them.

Well for one, if you want to be giving your players lots of Void Points!

I'm fairly certain the rules are that if you don't tell them the TN, then they get a free Void. So if you want to encourage heavy Void use, just keep TNs concealed.

Edit: Page 297 "When to Reveal or Conceal the TN"

43 minutes ago, Hida Jitenno said:

Well for one, if you want to be giving your players lots of Void Points!

I'm fairly certain the rules are that if you don't tell them the TN, then they get a free Void. So if you want to encourage heavy Void use, just keep TNs concealed.

Edit: Page 297 "When to Reveal or Conceal the TN"

I tell them most of the time. If it's one that is always fixed by rules, I don't bother, and they don't get the VP, because it's on their Character sheet or is unchanging (to hit, for example). I will tell them the base formula but not what the actual TN is, and only let them have a VP if they fail because of that.

I also often flip their advantages when it makes story sense, granting a void point when it's not an opponent NPC using a VP. (If they use a adversity, they only get it if they fail, as per RAW.)

I have no problem with them using them a lot; both groups love concealed difficulties - but also, I tell them my rolls, so they know what I rolled and how many... (one of my two groups can't see this - because they're over VOIP.) I only roll behind the screen when they don't see the event. So, Ring and skill is revealed by use. (disposition, Ads and Disads are not unless used.)

Just because I tell them a modifier doesn't mean I reveal the base, either.

I have taken to stocking my NPC's with VP - roll void ring dice, and each success is one VP available. Advantage and strife ignored, explosives only count a success.

57 minutes ago, Hida Jitenno said:

Well for one, if you want to be giving your players lots of Void Points!

I'm fairly certain the rules are that if you don't tell them the TN, then they get a free Void. So if you want to encourage heavy Void use, just keep TNs concealed.

Edit: Page 297 "When to Reveal or Conceal the TN"

That's such a silly rule though. I mean, FFG suggests the players should know the TN most of the time. Hiding the TN is extremely annoying any time bonus successes matter too. I'm all for refreshing VPs at a decent frequency and for certain rolls it just makes sense that the TN is not known, but connecting those two things makes no sense to me.

10 hours ago, nameless ronin said:

That's such a silly rule though. I mean, FFG suggests the players should know the TN most of the time. Hiding the TN is extremely annoying any time bonus successes matter too. I'm all for refreshing VPs at a decent frequency and for certain rolls it just makes sense that the TN is not known, but connecting those two things makes no sense to me.

There are lots of times it makes sense... most of the time, interpersonal actions are based upon target's vigilance or focus (situational which). Unless they know the target's demeanor and rings, they don't know the base.

Likewise, anything they're not skilled in and equal to or higher than the ring in use can reasonably be "You don't know how hard it is to do X."

5 hours ago, AK_Aramis said:

There are lots of times it makes sense... most of the time, interpersonal actions are based upon target's vigilance or focus (situational which). Unless they know the target's demeanor and rings, they don't know the base.

Likewise, anything they're not skilled in and equal to or higher than the ring in use can reasonably be "You don't know how hard it is to do X."

Yes - but the (to me) silly part is connecting that with VP recovery. You don't know how hard something is, so you are incentivized to take on more strife, but in return you get a VP so you can be more effective on a following roll. It's a bunch of mechanical effects jumbled together for no logical reason.

1 hour ago, nameless ronin said:

Yes - but the (to me) silly part is connecting that with VP recovery. You don't know how hard something is, so you are incentivized to take on more strife, but in return you get a VP so you can be more effective on a following roll. It's a bunch of mechanical effects jumbled together for no logical reason.

It's the base difficulty that appears to be sometimes hidden, and just because it's unknown (for legitimate reasons provided), doesn't mean the players are powerless to do anything to improve their odds.

It's important to emphasize that checks are more than binary success or failure, and include elements of efficiency, quality, and finesse.

If a player does minimal investigation to learn about the challenge, they shouldn't necessarily know the TN, but VPs give a built in mechanism for performing the check more proficiently through experience. At least that's how I'm reconciling it!

It's basically a compensation. "You're trying to boost dramatic tension by concealing from the players something they would normally know, but you have to give the player back a point to show you're not just punking him". I see it as similar to the way pools of Destiny and Story points work - when the GM spends one it flows back into the player side of the pool. When concealing, you as the GM are doing something optional, the game says you don't have to do it and when doing so you're dramatically altering the player's kept dice calculus - it means they'll probably prefer less Opp and try and get more successes to pass not knowing how much they need, so they'll probably take some strife because they no longer have access to the information they usually have which lets them make informed decisions. The rolling is (in more ways than one) more stressful, so here's a Void Point to encourage you to relax because you still got something out of it. Same reason why Disadvantages give Void Points, the narrative is making you "suffer" so we'll give you VP to be more dramatic later so you know it's not just antagonistic.

3 hours ago, T_Kageyasu said:

It's the base difficulty that appears to be sometimes hidden, and just because it's unknown (for legitimate reasons provided), doesn't mean the players are powerless to do anything to improve their odds.

It's important to emphasize that checks are more than binary success or failure, and include elements of efficiency, quality, and finesse.

If a player does minimal investigation to learn about the challenge, they shouldn't necessarily know the TN, but VPs give a built in mechanism for performing the check more proficiently through experience. At least that's how I'm reconciling it!

Ok, but that's not what the rules say. By the rules, hidden TN = free VP for a later use that may or may not have anything to do with the check they got the VP from (and usually it doesn't).

2 hours ago, UnitOmega said:

It's basically a compensation. "You're trying to boost dramatic tension by concealing from the players something they would normally know, but you have to give the player back a point to show you're not just punking him". I see it as similar to the way pools of Destiny and Story points work - when the GM spends one it flows back into the player side of the pool. When concealing, you as the GM are doing something optional, the game says you don't have to do it and when doing so you're dramatically altering the player's kept dice calculus - it means they'll probably prefer less Opp and try and get more successes to pass not knowing how much they need, so they'll probably take some strife because they no longer have access to the information they usually have which lets them make informed decisions. The rolling is (in more ways than one) more stressful, so here's a Void Point to encourage you to . relax because you still got something out of it. Same reason why Disadvantages give Void Points, the narrative is making you "suffer" so we'll give you VP to be more dramatic later so you know it's not just antagonistic.

P. 297: "For the majority of checks, we recommend the GM tell the players the TN. However, there are some rare occasions where the difficulty of a task would not be something the characters could accurately assess."

Following the guidelines in the book, you hide TNs only if the difficulty of the task is not something the PCs can determine. If they would normally know it, then they do - at least that's the suggestion. This is not a matter of compensating the players for taking something away. The GM should not take away that information unless it makes sense that that information is not available.

3 hours ago, nameless ronin said:

and usually it doesn't 

Well if they failed and care about the outcome. I never said VP must apply to that check only.

Call it a compensation, bonus, or whatever else you want for making an immediate challenge slightly more difficult or ambiguous in exchange for a perk on a later check the PC cares more about. It's not like a void point is going to break the system. Disconnected from the immediate circumstances- sure that's an outcome, but nothing I personally worry about in my game.

You and others have made plenty of good suggestions for when it is appropriate to hide the TN.

@nameless ronin

Storygame math, in a nutshell:

• Characters generally should trend towards success.
• Success is its own reward.
• Failure is a negative which should be balanced with a later positive effect.
  • VP fill the role of carrying the positive for later, but not too much later.

Now, for comparison to other games...

• In the Cortex Plus games, bad rolls get you plot points and temporary drawbacks. Good rolls accomplish things.
  • Players have a reason to tell the GM about their 1's.
  • players get compensatoon for accepting disads
• In Fate - when you are nerfed by your aspects, you get a plot point. When you are boosted by them, you pay a PP.
• In 2d20 (Modiphius' house engine) the system punishes bad rolls, without compensation for bad rolls.
  • In 2d20, in my experience, about 10% of players will cheat to avoid the bad effects.
  • The result can be a snowball, where bad rolls early can break he chances of success.
    • I had a session where I'd more than 20 unused threat, and the players had, through bad rolls along, managed to ****** defeat from the jaws of victory. They did everything the adventure called for, but aa series of bad rolls early resulted in failing epically.

Fate and Cortex Plus both have beneficial feedback loops. Which makes them work well; players have less incentive to cheat, and thus more interesting stories are created. In 2d20, the bad is either bad now, or bad later, no good. So players see no benefit of bad rolls, it doesn't happen much, but it does snowball from time to time.

L5R 5 is much like Fate and CP - failure isn' to be feared, bu embraced, and the token reward is a good motivator.