I've just started GM'ing WFRPG over the last few weeks. I'm running the "Elder Eye' adventure from Tome of Adventure, and so far two things jumped out at my group as sources of concern:

1) An average difficulty challenge means two challenge dice, which can be pretty brutal all by themselves. 5/8 of the die has failures, and 1/4 has two failures. It seems quite easy to get three failures. On the other hand, characterisitic dice are not nearly as generous. An average characteristic is 3, and even with the extra die, the probability of all successes getting washed out seems to be over 50%. 2d difficulty is actually quite rough. Stance dice can make a difference, but stance dice (apparently) don't come into play during story mode.

2) Pancake factor. There doesn't seem to be much variation in damage output. Usually, three successes are needed for either a player or creature action to inflict more than basic damage, and it felt like a struggle to even get one success (or boon, for crit purposes). When damage is simply a matter of weapon + strength, and soak is just a matter of armor + toughness, it seems pretty easy to wind up with attackers that wash out damage. Over time, players will probably upgrade their armor to even better gear, and monster damage will stay the same.

Any thoughts?

steveg700 said:

Congrats on getting into this great game! I would say in answer to your questions:

1) Don't worry about this perceived imbalance- with skills and rank modifers and bonuses (not to mention the use of fortune dice) this does not seem to be a problem in actual play. I allow players to go one into a stance, and only one way or the other based on character.

2) This is where it all comes down to selecting good action cards. Give your NPCs really deadly cards. I reccomend Hero's Call if you do not already own it.

I had the same impression as you at first. Then I used the stat app to figure out probabilities and reversed my position.

2D average challenge is very easy to succeed at if you are proficient (4 stat +1 Expertise).

If you aren't (3 stat no Expertise), then you'll effectively have around 50% chance of success. Which is normal, since you are unskilled and not particularly gifted. You should mostly limit yourself to trying out EASY checks (1D).

Average 2D checks are mostly succeeded by proficient characters and often failed by unskilled ones. Just keep that in mind as you GM.

Steve: Try this link for a probability calculator: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/167876/WFRP3%20Full%20html%20Dice%20Roller%20All%20Probability%20Included/WFRP3%20Online%20Dice%20Roller%20All%20Probability%20Included/diceprob/diceprob.html

3 blue and 2 purple give success 38% of the time. One purple and 3 blue is 41%. Now, this is if the person has no expertise, no white dice, and no stance dice going.

It probably shows that only people with skill should be regularly attempting actions. For example: The trollslayer shouldn't be trying to negotiate the week's pay with the mayor of the town And the Scribe shouldn't be attempting to climb across the rope bridge.

I usually go with 1 purple as standard difficulty, but we're moving to two because my players have increased their stats and almost all of them now have Fortune dice in their main characteristics.

jh

Thank you for the replies.

Jericho said:

A 50% chance is indeed perfectly reasonable for an unkilled attempt at a task of average difficulty. But that does not seem to be how the math bears out…

Emirikol said:

That's a great link to have. Thanks again. Unfortunatly, the bottom line here seems to be that even an easy task invites a high risk of failure, much less a supposedly average challenge. This means that characters who don't come to a task loaded for bear will be discouraged from making an attempt. Not only won't the troll-slayer attempt to negotiate the week's pay, he'll simply switch off during story mode scenes that don't cater to his strengths, at least if he's invested in things playing out positively. I think I need to come up with a method by which characters can leverage some stance dice during story mode. Stance dice seem to be an integral factor in thsi game's dice pool mechanic, particularly for characters who are out of their area of optimization, so it strikes me as odd that they're set aside in such a large chunk of the game.

I think I'll allow one shift during the course of a story scene, and then allow two boons on certain checks to provide further adjustments.

Johann Rowlocks said:

Well, I'm using creatures from the bestiary. Beastmen attack as beastmen do, And apparently that means using savage strike a lot. I could have used a basic melee strike, but +2 damage with two boons seems like a better deal than +2 damage with three successes.

But even with chainmail, that's seven or eight soak, which trumps many mosnters.

Sure - but the beastman leader could certainly have a few cards that are "above and beyond" which have helped secure his leadership position…

My take on it…

difficulty:

Considering that a "normal yokel" in WFRP 2ed had a 30% chance on a "challanging" check (+/-0) and 40% on an easy one (+10), the normal checks with 2purple are quite generous…. (to refresh memory: a normal person had soemthing around 30 in each characteristic and the checks were based on these percentaqges).

However the checks were only on basic skills, trained by that person, untrained it was HALF of this.

So all in all the NPCs and PCs are quite competent compared to the earlier versions.

Damage:

The damage given for creatures are, in my understanding, *unarmed*. However most sentient creatures, even the goblins from Gobo Dumbsticker use some spears (Damage 5 or even 6 when used 2handed).

Now, imaging that wargor brandishing a 2handed flail… supported by his ungor lackeys throwing/sticking spears into that troll-slayer…

AND of course you can always give them some nice actions… a rampaging black-orc for excample is a perfect candidate for a reckless cleave… in reckless stance… with the 2handed axe… and 2 yellow dice… now if that comet shows up your PC is toast! or rather sushi…

But this is like in every other hack and slash scenario…

Just give those temporary insanities a lot of tracking tokesn and watch your PCs go over the edge into the dark pit of insanity (the waste bin)

Cheers and happy gaming

addendum:

AND do not forget… a sucessful attack does at least 1 damage.

Now… I might be mistaken, but my rule is:

success: only the success count…

if boons give additional benefits they are counted AFTER the successful attack.

So you make 1 point of damage.

And your 4 boons give you +2 +1 critical:

thats 3 wounds, 1 of it is a critical.

correct me if i am wrong…

Cheers

Olaf

steveg700 said:

Indeed I messed up. I had only retrieved the expertise die, using a stat of 4 blue dice against 2 purple. So yes, a stat of 3 against n Average difficulty is 38% only.

I second previous posters that say that in play, the mechanics don't seem flawed and work well. The use of Action cards is key to make opponents more powerful and surprise your players. That has to be stressed. Happy gaming !

It boils down to why you think the percentages are unreasonable?

An average character (3 stat) that is trained in a task has a 53% chance to succeed on an average task. 73% on an easy task. 93% on a simple task.

He is an AVERAGE character. Note, this does not include any stance dice. A single red/green stance die increases the probability for success by ~5%. So, that average character, in full stance, will have between a 63-67% chance of succeeding in the attempt. Remember, it is an AVERAGE task. It isn't an easy or simple task. AVERAGE, in WFRP, means it is a task which equals and challenges the character's skill. It is intentionally slightly above 50%, because that is what AVERAGE means in WFRP. More skilled characters will have an easier time, as will characters with better statistics in the related area.

Personally, I think that you are misunderstanding the meaning/intent of AVERAGE difficulty. It really is intended to be the level where an average character will succeed about 50% of the time. If two characters in an opposed test have the same characteristic value, essentially with all things being equal, they are essentially even odds. Thus, 50% of the time one will win, while the other 50% of the time the other will win. Perfectly reasonable, isn't it?

Keep in mind that most combat checks are not opposed checks, and have a default difficulty of 1d … which is "Easy" difficulty. Unless, of course, as the GM you want combat to be more difficult and relay more on the relative skill of combatants. This will, slightly, make hitting in combat more difficult, as the difficulty becomes "average" much of the time. Less skilled/lower characteristic combatants will have a harder time hitting, while more skilled/higher characteristic characters will potentially hit easier.

An average character will have 4 and not 3 in his stat. With 1 training dice it goes up to 60% success rate for an Average (2d) check, 79% for an Easy (1d) check and 96% for a Simple (0d) check. This is assuming he does not have any fortune dice on his stat (a fortune dice will rise the change by around 6%)

Just a remark

Yepes

Yepesnopes said:

The ToA lists a characteristic of 3 as being "average for a Human". Characters might have 4 in their primary characteristics or areas of expertise, but they would be considered "above average" in those areas.

Kartigan said:

When you create a PC with 25 cps, I cannot see who he/she will have stats at 3. Definitively, an average starting character will have at least two stats 4, that is assuming he/she is not an elf or a dwarf. Therefore an average character will have stats of 4 in at least two areas.

Cheers,

Yepes