So, you're playing a game of AH by yourself, no one around, that knows how to play anyway. You're in the middle of an intense game when you get to a tricky roll. You look and you roll and--you fail. Oh but--what's this? You forgot to take into account your Skill card! Oh, well, you can't make a fair roll just rolling one extra dice, now can you? After all, you're entitled to roll them all at once! Nothing to do but roll the same check with the additional dice--and it won't cost you clue tokens since, well, you aren't technically making the same roll, right?

Has this happened to you? I know it's happened to me a few times. I bring it up mostly because I want to get it out there that I do this but also to inquire as to group play too. I recently had a game with a pair of new players who are more casual gamers and play for pure fun. They had a string of bad rolls and so there was a few times they asked me to let them re-roll. I did since we were in a 'party' mood but I do have to ask, how often do you, especially with new players, allow this sort of thing? Should we allow this sort of thing?

We would not allow new players to reroll just because they had bad luck.

We would allow them to add dices after their roll if they have forgotten about a specific skill they could have used or something like this.

Also we allow new players to adjust their skill sliders if they have forgotten during upkeep (like: Uh, I wanted to fight that ugly monster but I forgot that I would need to pass a horrorcheck and now my will is way too low...)

Allowing those things is okay in my opinion and I think the game will seem less complex for the new players with this method. On the other side, they would surely learn quicker if the were thrown in the cold water (?)...

As Schwaig said, it's acceptable forgetting something (until this makes NO game alteration; I'd allow a newcomer to say "hey, I wanted to cast Find Gate this turn and I totally forgot to adjust sliders during Upkeep" because it's clear that it is something he forgot, but I won't allow a "hey, this encounter demands me to test Luck, and I wanted to max Luck during Upkeep but I forgot" because the same player won't probably say the same if he wanted to max Luck and the encounter forced him to test Lore) - in the same way it's possible to forget an Environment effect - but it's not acceptable saying things like: "I forgot one die, so let's reroll all 9" or "I usuall touch my breast while rolling to keep the Blessing; this time I forgot to do it, so the '1' is not valid" (that's my friend Cat :eyerolls:).

This said, I'll add: although the Dark Side is strong, don't allow it to tempt you. You can win, you can lose, but the game must be fair

Julia's words resonate with me. Yes, I've been there...and yes, if I've missed an extra die because I used a Clue token for a skill check in which I have that Skill card...I'll roll another die, but not the entire roll of dice!

Nope, I never do the "complete" re-roll, I only eventually add dice I have forgotten. In fact I do only the opposite: if I roll, say, 3 dice, 2 successes needed, and I get the 2 successes, but then I remember I had a -1 penalty to the roll, I will re-roll with only 2 dice. Which I wouldn't do if only 1 success was needed to begin with, as a -1 wouldn't affect the roll anyway (because 2 successes were rolled).

And I never, ever allow people to cheat a game that can't even talk back

Slider adjustment is another thing, though. I do and allow exactly what Julia described. Otherwise I would have to make each Upkeep phase last 10 minutes so everything is 100% for sure where it should be.

Only problem with slider adjustment is that it makes something like Precognition unnecessary! XD

Only problem with slider adjustment is that it makes something like Precognition unnecessary! XD

It's still a good option for The Great Ritual!

Ah, right! Good point! I had a game last night, darndest thing--got two people with Revealing Script, two people with Foresee and one person with Precog. One of the two wound up getting dusted by Qu, so she passed off her stuff to the other character who wound up with double of nearly all of her spells, useless as they were. ^^;

Julia your friend Cat is too much! That's just hilarious. I think next time she arrives, you should wave your arms in the air and chant, telling her its The Voorish Sign to ward off obvious rulebending.

Dice. They can be cruel, or they can be kind. But they are so much more than random number generators. What are they really? We need to understand this when we pick them up and throw them at the padded walls.

They are tension generators. Tension. When you pick them up, they burn with that tension. Its what good GMs know - when you hand them out, you are saying that you don't know what will happen next.

So we need to treat dice with respect or the tension will leech away from our gaming. That means no free total reroll, just the one you forgot, and about the only time you should force one is when you realise you had less dice than you rolled.

As for other bends not involving dice, I am a reasonable guy and will let some things go for some people and situations. Julia pretty much outlined the boundary of what is acceptable there.

Julia your friend Cat is too much! That's just hilarious. I think next time she arrives, you should wave your arms in the air and chant, telling her its The Voorish Sign to ward off obvious rulebending.

Point is... she would be perfectly ok with that, and will probably ask about details and whether this improves the successes ratio on average :laughter:

So we need to treat dice with respect or the tension will leech away from our gaming. That means no free total reroll, just the one you forgot, and about the only time you should force one is when you realise you had less dice than you rolled.

As for other bends not involving dice, I am a reasonable guy and will let some things go for some people and situations. Julia pretty much outlined the boundary of what is acceptable there.

You made me think of another possible "reroll" situation some friends play with. If a die is rolled so that it falls off the table and hits the floor, or you roll more or less dice than allowed, you reroll. But you reroll *always* even if the four dice on the table are four successes and you have 5 dice to kill The Beast. I think it's acceptable too: it's a universal rule that is always applied, not applied only when you have bad luck

Yes, that kind of thing occurred to me too. It should cut both ways- if you are going to do it, whatever it is, it should be impartial and not selective.

If I forget something and I'm playing by myself, then that's just tough. I consider myself to be capable of dealing with a tougher game than most of my friends, with a certain grim joy in losing. So i have to hold myself to a higher standard.Not only would I not do a full roll, I'd likely declare the die forfeited if playing solo.