RQ4 Playtest Discussion: Skill vs skill, and more heresy

Skill vs skill, and more heresy

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From: Loren J. Miller (MILLERL@wharton.upenn.edu)
Date: Tue 01 Feb 1994 - 02:23:07 EET

Given that some people like Paul Reilly think we should discard the
"lower is better" philosophy in RQ, what is their reason for sticking
with that philosophy for critical and special successes?

If I wanted to abandon the lower is better philosophy I'd also change
the way crits and specials are computed, so that people didn't have to
divide by 5 or 20. Here's the first thing I'd try.

Any roll where the ones digit is a 0 and the tens digit is even is a
critical. If it is a success then it's a critical success, if it's a
failure then it's a fumble.

Any roll where the ones digit is a 0 or 5 is a special. If it is a
success then it's a special success (impale, etc). If it's a failure
it's a botch (if you use that rule).

This system is also a simple comparison system, just like the high roll
under skill system for skill contests. Do you like it? For the most part
it's simple, but if skills get over 100 then you have to do some weird
stuff to get it to work out the same.

SUPER SKILLS

For skills over 100%, as they go up you add N more chances for criticals
and specials as the margin of success goes over Nx100. For skills over
Nx100%, any roll where the last digit is N or N+5 and the roll is >Nx100
under the skill is a special. Augment criticals the same way. I know
this is where it starts getting complicated to describe, but it's pretty
simple actually.

Here's an example of criticals. In the standard system a roll of 20 is a
critical success if you have a skill of 80. If you have a skill of 130
then not only are 20, 40, 60, and 80 criticals (96-00 is still
auto-fail, so 00 is a fumble), but so is a 01 and 21. If your skill is
150, then so is a 41.

It works about the same with specials. With a skill of 120, not only are
all the 0s and 5s special successes, but so are the 1s and 6s that are
less than or equal to 120-100=20. With a skill of 220, the specials are
5-7 and 0-2 on up to rolls of 20, and 5-6 and 0-1 above.

SUMMARY

Does a system like this appeal to anybody?

whoah,
+++++++++++++++++++++++23
Loren Miller internet: MILLERL@wharton.upenn.edu
"Enough sound bites. Let's get to work." -- Ross Perot sound bite

0,,

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