Quick question - can a character buy multiple fortune dice on a single characteristic in one career? eg 2 fortune dice on his Strength characteristic with 2 advances (if he has 2 listed under 'fortune' on his career card, of course).

Yes. Core, pg. 37. PG, pg. 45.

-Thorvid

Cheers, thanks.

Out of curiosity, did the PG clarify if these fortune dice couldn't exceed one's rank? This seems to be how most people are playing it.

Well, the PC is rank 1. So is there a rule clarification somewhere - yet another one, sigh - that says you can't apply more than 1 fortune die to any one characteristic per rank?

No. Most careers have limited Fortune Die pools however. Limit by rank is a house rule, albeit a fair one.

There are too many rules to keep track of as it is without introducing house ones!

That house rule would be a poke in the eye for the Commoner and Mystic, who have 3 fortune advances available, and are basic careers.

-Thorvid

fortune dice to characteristics seems a good way of letting players improve their characters best characteristics without having to pay a lot of advancements - and a lot close-career ones. fortune can only be added to the primary characteristics of the creer, right?

but it sure looks a lot if the Thug of my group, who already has Str 5, adds all his Fortune advances in Str. When he gets to, say, Mercenary, maybe he'll be adding 4 Fortune dices just for his Str value each roll!

the trouble is, meddling with the rules are a sure way to break the game, as Thorvid has shown us. they just love to use 3ed mechanics in creative and colourful ways, it's hard to prevent from stepping on a side rule.

I think I'll just talk with the Thug's player over this. he sure has the great possibility of adding Fortune to one other characteristic, I'll try and sell him that. if he becomes too much more of a monster in combat as he already is (with 7 experience), I think even combat stop being fun even for him.

or I'll just have to start hurting him good in return. and let the others take care of whatever puts the Thug down... that will be mean...

sorry. mindstorming...

The house rule in question is not game breaking by any means. It's just that any house rule has repercussions that might not be immediately visible.

Lots of fortune dice in any one stat can unbalance gameplay, but only if that stat is unreasonably weighted in the context of a campaign. If combat is the most common challenge that is present in a campaign, players will greatly favor advances that give them combat advantage. Also, if combat is the only type of challenge that has immediate negative feedback for failure, players will favor it.

If each encounter challenges a character in many ways (a rough balance of stats checked), and all challenges have visible and tangible repercussions for failure, then character advances will be spent differently - A player will choose to focus tightly to overcome and shine in specific challenges, or spend advances to compensate for shortcomings to be ready for any challenge. Advances will most likely be taken according to character concept if a clear numeric advantage is avoided by making all stats desirable. FFG has not fully fostered this concept in WFRP 3, though they do seem to be trying; There are more combat actions than non-combat actions, by far, and the published adventures are pretty combat heavy. That is a shame, because there is so much more to Warhammer than combat.

@Pedro - if your player insists on spending advances to increase his strength fortune dice for his thug, maybe let him be a paragon of melee destruction. Let him shine bright in the heat of battle. Then challenge him in other ways: chasing someone on a four story roof in a rainstorm, shaking off the effects of a poison, trying to resist the lure of another drink, spotting the cutpurse who's stealing his loot, or convincing the judge not to have him hanged.

-Thorvid

Excelent post Thorvid, I highly agree (and approve!). I'm playing a combat-oriented Sigmarite, but my first action purchase (and to day most useful spell) is divine perseverance (which is a mental/social card).

As a point of note, think about what fortune dice in Strength does. Your Thug will hit hard (with extra successes and boons more than likely), and hit accurately (less likely to miss), but this die pool doesn't change things all that much. For example, extra fortune dice don't add base damage (unlike strength advances). And while he may hit more accurately/harder he isn't parrying any better, increasing his defense or soak. If he is your heavy hitter (which is likely with a pool like that) he's no more durable than any stam 3-4 character.

Remember to have ambushes pop up to showcase his low init/observation. In our game social encounters with tracks are common (and I disagree, while a number of the pre-designed encounters do feature deadly combat, the majority of the adventures aside from Gathering Storm seem to have far more 'intuition/observation' checks than anything else. It's mostly investigative sandbox play with rapidfire deadly combat once the clues are put together), which he may stumble through. He might get all 'hulk smash' but with a low will he would get intimidated easily, and with a low fellowship he would get rotten deals on things.

Making a game enjoyable is about challenging your players, while letting them shine. Sure he hits hard, but that axe-wielding wargor will bisect him about as fast as he will anyone else. So don't be concerned about how HARD he hits, just remember to put things in that either he can't hit, or that require a different stat block to resolve (how about them insanites? What's his will? Taint? Corruption?)

Excellent points folks spot on. I'll be amused when my group finds themselves in a far more investigative/social/urban context, and there's a sudden scrambling for non-combat related advances! They're already starting to realise they're a bit weak in that department.

Some things worth mentioning to the players, is that while fortune dice are a cheap way of boosting stats, pure stats have many advantages.

For stats you'll greatly improve all opposed checks, getting a stat to 4, will often mean you have only 1 challenge dice in opposed checks, while you had 2 at 3 (seeing as most opponents will have average 3 in stats). 5 won't give you much, but getting a stat to 6 means you suddenly have zero challenge dice to many checks...

Stats also give better results, strength/agility for damage, toughness for soak and fatigue thresshold, willpower for stress threshold and equilibrium. Int and Fel don't give you much return, but Fel has many many opposed checks, so that will often be an important stat.

For Int/Fel, I suggest (like someone else also suggested), that the GM start making NPC's "attack" players with social actions. Nothing is more compelling an argument, than to say to your player(s) "Oh... you really can't help but agree to helping the noble, leave his house, pay twice the amount to the merchant, etc...". If the players can use social skills against NPC's, it should also work the other way around!!! If the players don't do it, you can impose HEAVY penalties to them, empty the party fortune pool, have the rumour spread of the stingy characters, so everyone charges extra for everything etc...

This said, I can't see any problem in restricting the fortune dice to one per stat per rank, or even one per stat in total untill every stat has fortune dice, then they can build up again. Fortune dice, is fortune/luck, so it doesn't really make much sense to boost a character with 4 fortune dice to strength, and not have any other. I've yet to see someone weak, be very lucky in arm-wrestles, and not lucky in other situations...

If a player wants to improve a stat, he can do it by actually improving the stat, fortune dice should, in my world, be to improve stats your character career doesn't allow raising.

On a slight tangent, the whole 'force players to do something because that's what the NPC rolled' concept is new to me and would never work in my group.

One of the most glaring passages in The Gathering Storm is in the last chapter, where it says "if confronted, Schulmann attempts to lie his way out of it with an opposed Guile vs Intuition check". I just find that utterly bizarre. If the players failed this 'check', they would never accept being told what to think by the rules in that way.

There's another weird one, right at the climactic point where Schulmann does a runner on the PCs and heads for the nexus: "allow a PC to attempt to notice something amiss about Schulmann if they pass a Daunting Intuition check." I really would think I wasn't doing my job as a GM properly if I had spoon-feed my players results like this.

I understand using Social encounters if the PCs are trying to convince NPCs, but it doesn't work the other way around: I can't force my players what to think as a result of some die rolls.

UniversalHead said:

It's called roleplaying...

Don't mean to offend...

But put it this way: You're not your NPC's as GM, you Roleplay the NPC's. The players are not their characters, they Roleplay them.

I would be extremely anoyed at players who wants me to accept all lies they feed me, because it's "just" NPC's and their roll succeeded, when I could never do the same with a roll!?!

But I guess it's the same old story about the GM being the entertainments manager, while the players can just lean back and let the GM do all the work.

GM has to prepare for the campaign, I as a GM prepare every single session, maybe spending up to 10 hour's for a single session, players... turn up. If my players didn't meet me halfway and atleast roleplayed, and entertained me as well, I might as well read a good book instead.

I took this discussion once with a player, he didn't roleplay the results NPC's "forced" him to, so I stopped roleplaying the other way around. Apparently he got very anoyed when a judge put him in prison, because his lie was unbelivable to me, yes me as GM. The other players got the joke, but he didn't... very sad.

UniversalHead said:

On the original topic: Limit of 1 fortune die per stat per rank has the problem that you can only buy said dice for career skills (of which there are ever only 2 per career to date), and you can only procure them using free career advances. So you cannot buy out-of-career, or for non-career stats. As there are multiple careers that have 3 fortune point advances (such as the seer) this mechanically hampers them. So yes, there are rule reasons why this house-rule can have problems.

On the additional topic:

Forcing is bad. It doesn't fly in most groups aside from mystical mind control. Players have free will, and their characters do correspondingly, and denying them choice makes it so they don't even have to be there (you play their chars, or you just write the story). It's part of most groups' social contract that this doesn't occur. There's an implicit agreement that the PCs control the characters, and the GM controls everything else.

The thing is that sometimes I pull this off by making a roll beforehand and simply trying to roleplay convincingly. If I can't think of a single thing to say that could get me out of a situation, chances are whatever lie he tries to feed PC's with trained intuition and an int of 4+ is probably not going to fly either.

However, there are a number of groups who don't pick up clues, and don't necessarily even follow plot. When my group did a number of adventures there was a half-dozen spots for 'observation' checks to figure out that an ambush was coming that we never needed, because we were alert contextually (IE we recognized story wise that one was likely) and working together to scout. However, if your group is 4 beefcakes of which one is busy polishing his weapon, the second is reading through action cards to try and pick his next biggest attack, the third is busy intimidating the coach driver or wheedling one more silver out of the party fee, and the fourth is texting someone ... you may need to ask for rolls for people to notice things. Some groups are all fired up and know the drill from years of roleplaying, and some people were bought the shiny box for Christmas and are trying to puzzle it out, so those things need to be in adventures to try and provide options and flow.

But I agree, forcing wouldn't work so much, and probably isn't a good idea unless the PCs know the stakes beforehand. "I'd like to buy this." "Well the price is X (higher than avg) unless you'd like to haggle, remember if you lose you'll end up paying the higher fee." If the PC picks up the dice, there isn't much else to be said at that point. They've implicitly agreed.

And @Spivo:

Yikes dude. The only thing I can tell you is that the Gygaxian era of players vs GMs is kind of dying a quick death. Not saying your player may not have needed a bit of an attitude shift, but try to be a fan of the characters. I run a game bi-weekly (and play in one) and I think all the characters in it are awesome and interesting. If you are running a game, half the entertainment is seeing these cool people survive to fight another day (or die dramatically). It's like watching a movie. You know the premise (preview) but not what's actually going to happen. If you don't think their char's are cool, work with them to make them so. Also ... what do you do for 10 hours to prep o,O I do like 1... maybe 2 tops.

shinma said:

I don't mean GM vs players, like "Let me see if I can kill them today...". But I am tired of the attitude of some players, who seem to believe the GM is there as their servitor, and all they have to do is turn up (which the GM should apploud them for btw...).

If the GM can roleplay his NPC's, why the heck can't the players roleplay their characters???

In my game 2 people in the group discovered their father was killed (and didn't die in an accident), we continue for 3 sessions after that, and in a conversation one of them drops the "Remember, we still have to find out fathers murder!", and one of the other chars went "Our father was murdered????"

Turns out (which I hadn't even noticed), that this player character was not present at any of the discussions concerning this, so he'd gone for 3 sessions not knowing how their father died...

Now, you can discuss if it's roleplaying, but it's at the very least keeping player and character seperated, and that is the first step to roleplaying, in my world anyway...

Now, I totally agree with you, that the fun is seeing the players (meaning: their characters) act to the enviroment you put them in, and to the situations you present, but the players are not demigods, that can be nitpicking of which part of the world they wish to affect them. So if I say "He's VERY convincing!", then he IS very convincing! Just like a player can't say "Nah... he didn't hit me...", "But the roll says he did!!!"... "Nah... I stepped to the side before his blow landed..." Attack rolls from NPC's players accept, but not social rolls?

People can play their games like they want, but I think many players are being quite unfair to some GM's (who often roleplay 10+ chars, while the players can't even roleplay a single one...).

I prepare roughly 10 hours before each sessions early in a campaign, because I have no clue where my players go, so I have to "map" out what can happen in many "directions". So I read up on Ubersreik, so I don't have to look stuff up. I make several encounters, with names, etc...

Anyway, I spend 10 hours But my players seem to enjoy it, and they roleplay well, so I get a good return on my effort.

I completely understand what you mean Spivo, and certainly you have some dedicated players if they roleplay their characters so separately from their own personalities. I think it's more a matter of playing style though. While my players roleplay different personalities from their real-world ones (with a bit of crossover of course!), in the case I was discussing I'm not so much talking about asking them to roleplay a personality trait, but to roleplay something that is against all their assumptions and deductions up to that point.

It wouldn't be much of a game if all the PCs decisions were made for them by characteristic rolls, so players make their own decisions based on the information they receive from the GM through his descriptions and roleplaying. If I play the bad guy in such a way - through my roleplaying, and through his actions as a NPC - that gives the players cause to suspect him about something, but to then make a roll and tell the PCs "you don't suspect him" - well, it feels forced to me. Also, the players would begin to think that they have no control over their character's actions, but are controlled by dice rolls, which they then have to 'play out' - even if they go against everything they've suspected up until then.

It's two very different styles of roleplaying and I can see the merits of both - but my players (and most of them are veterans of almost 30 years of roleplaying games) just wouldn't accept that kind of control over their actions. They game to roleplay characters, sure, but they also game to reach the climax of a plot by exercising their own ingenuity (and their sword arms as well, of course!)

UniversalHead said:

I don't mind this either really, and I very very rarely use NPC social actions vs them.

But I started the discussion due to some wanting to "gentle" push players towards focusing on social stats (int, fel), and not just combat stats.

And using your above way of playing, it only works if the players roleplay their stats, so the FEL 2 char snorts/sniffs his arms pits etc... while trying to chat up a lady, or the Int 2-3 char pretty much believes everything the nobleman tells him.

And if players roleplay their stats poorly, the GM should "abuse" NPC social actions on them, and if the players didn't want to accept the results, the GM should not accept it the other way around. To me NPC's social actions are there to "control" poor roleplayers.

Seeing as this has gotten off on a tangent anyway: It's very interesting to note how many roleplayers readily accept that the bodies of their characters may be influenced against their will by the actions of NPCs (read: hurt, tied up, starved) but resist the idea of the same NPCs influencing the behaviour, emotions and thoughts of the characters. To me, this seems like a completely artificial distinction, probably stemming from a simplistic view of human psychology. Humans are very susceptible to various kinds of social influence. Our emotions, thoughts and behaviour are not controlled completely by ourselves. Others may even change how we perceive our environment. The empirical evidence is abundant, so this isn't really a matter of debate. The interesting point, to me, is why we often don't accept this fact in roleplaying games, for instance by letting a convincing NPC be just that?

Keep in mind, just because the players are expecting an ambush, or believe there is a secret door in the bookcase, does not mean their their PC expects the ambush, spots the ambush, or finds the secret door. That is why the players roll.

I would not agree, for example, that if the group is walking around and the players expect an ambush around the bend that you as the GM automatically say they pass their observation checks to avoid being surprised. It might be worth giving them a bonus [W] for being alert (assuming they said their PCs were alert), but they still need to roll. If they fail, they weren't alert enough, or they thought the ambush was on the other side, or whatever.

There *is* a distinction between the player and the PC, and the knowledge and ability between the two.

Vulpus said:

I think Vulpus has a great point..

If you dont force players to do counterintuitive actions, based on dicerolls.. why ever roll dice..

If i thought my thug was bigger and meaner than the ungor beastman, and a better fighter.. Could i then just point out to my GM, that the beastman could not hit me, and then say I decapitate him, because it is in my nature?

It is called roleplaying for a reason. The stats are there to form your character, and the dice a there to play your character out. A part of the experience as a player, is to know what you characters don't know and roleplay them not knowing.. And if a bad role forces you not noticing you got a broken sword for double the price, well then you should have balanced out your stats...

I mean int/fel becomes useless, and therefore it becomes way easier to be a mean fighter, because he don't have to worry about being intimidated or not noticing the lies of the secret cult member describing his whereabouts, because the player, as a person is not "buying" his lies..

Imagine an actor come up to a director and say.. "I have cut out 25 pages of the script because its counterintuitive to me as a person.. I have never worshipped satan, therefore my character cannot"..

It is roleplaying. If your players want to notice every lie and see every ambush.. They must balance their stats accordingly!.. Of course through intuitive roleplay and player (not character) observations, fortune dice and challenge dice can be removed/added by the GM..

sorry for the offtopic post.. But it is and interesting discussion. And is related to this post in a way because if forcing players to perform the results of diceroll, the strength of putting all fortune dice in one stat, gets seriously crippled.