D&D 5th Edition XII: Peasant Militias Can Defeat Smartphones?

[Moreb Benhk]

In Savage Worlds, your skills and attributes are designated by die sizes, rather than numbers. Instead of having a Stealth skill of +3, you have a Stealth skill of 1d8. When you use a skill/attribute, you roll a die of the appropriate size. PCs and major NPCs also roll a d6, and use the better of the two rolls.

Having played that, I personally found the system to be dull and undifferentiated. "Skilled"/"powerful" people didn't feel hugely different from someone basically uninvested in it.

[Kurald Galain]

In Savage Worlds, your skills and attributes are designated by die sizes, rather than numbers. Instead of having a Stealth skill of +3, you have a Stealth skill of 1d8. When you use a skill/attribute, you roll a die of the appropriate size. PCs and major NPCs also roll a d6, and use the better of the two rolls.

While I appreciate the concept of it, I found than in practice a system like this markedly slows down gameplay whenever people have to roll a skill check, because they have to check and find which different dice they need every time. I don't think this has enough of a benefit to make this slowdown worthwhile.

[SiuiS]

While I appreciate the concept of it, I found than in practice a system like this markedly slows down gameplay whenever people have to roll a skill check, because they have to check and find which different dice they need every time. I don't think this has enough of a benefit to make this slowdown worthwhile.

Is the opportunity cost (~7 seconds every non-vital skill roll) really heavier than having a system which is within bounds of design oaks, complements the idea of fluff and crunch synergy and is more fun? Because it seems to me like going from "this literally does not work" to "first world problems" and that's a good transition. If your only complaint is "yeah, it's more fun and everything, but, like, it takes me 4 seconds to locat skills on my sheet except the ones I'm designed around using" that's a good place to be.

Isn't it?

[BayardSPSR]

I think part of the problem with Next is that the designers want to build this more realistic and simple system while still harkening back to- and using many of the same numbers as- were used in the past. It feels like they want to make Game X but are forced to use ideas and concepts from Game Y, many of which don't gel with Game X without jumping through a lot of hoops.

Yeah.

"Let's make a game that's realistic and simple and like earlier editions of D&D!"

"But earlier editions of D&D weren't simple or realistic..."

"And let's make it unite all the editions and all the players, too!"

It's like the designers are throwing out these design goals that are laudable but incompatible and not thinking particularly hard about their demands or implications. I'm starting to wonder if this kind of public beta is a good thing for them - for me, it kind of destroys the myth of competence. Maybe I'm being too harsh - this is the internet, after all; one must expect large numbers of people claiming they can do better. But in this case, I really do believe that half the people on this forum could design better than this company.

They're so sure they know what they're doing, but they're creating doubts. The cracks are showing. The emperor is not fully clothed.


@Moreb Benhk: I think that's an example where the differentiation seems a lot bigger on paper than it is in practice. 8 is so much more than 6, after all! In practice, of course, you can't base a system on dice and expect the dice to perform as is statistically probable.

Edit:

While I appreciate the concept of it, I found than in practice a system like this markedly slows down gameplay whenever people have to roll a skill check, because they have to check and find which different dice they need every time. I don't think this has enough of a benefit to make this slowdown worthwhile.

Personally, I find that rolling a d20 and trying to figure out which modifiers apply to it, then figure out what happens if I roll a twenty, whether that stuff happens if I rolled an 18 or 19 too, then figuring out which other dice I need to roll and the modifier to those, makes combat in D&D appallingly slow in practice - especially when I have to check in with someone else to determine if my first number was high enough to accomplish anything before continuing. Never mind trying to figure out how to derive those modifiers in the first place.

I suspect your experience relates to your relative unfamiliarity with the system. Most people here think D&D is easy to play somehow; personally, I still find it reliably and frustratingly time-consuming.

[Drachasor]

I can't help but feel that the d20 is holding the game back -- heck rolls to see if you do anything in a round are something I have grown to dislike.

I mean, it's fine to not succeed at something, but I think games would be better if you help weaken an enemy's defenses even if you don't hurt it.

[SiuiS]

I can't help but feel that the d20 is holding the game back -- heck rolls to see if you do anything in a round are something I have grown to dislike.

I mean, it's fine to not succeed at something, but I think games would be better if you help weaken an enemy's defenses even if you don't hurt it.

Yes to all this.

I wonder if, like, some form of regenerating ablative armor would work?
Temporary HP that refreshes each round.
A Circumstance bonus to AC and Saves which deceased each time it's used in a round.
That sort of dealio.

[Drachasor]

Yes to all this.

I wonder if, like, some form of regenerating ablative armor would work?
Temporary HP that refreshes each round.
A Circumstance bonus to AC and Saves which deceased each time it's used in a round.
That sort of dealio.

I've been messing around with this for a custom system I am working on. My concern with Temp HP that refreshes is that adds a lot of subtraction to the game. This is slower than addition, so that increases turn time. Temp HP is going to need to keep increasing as you level (to represent better defense, since you'd be dropping to-hit rolls entirely), this isn't a trivial thing.

But a dice-pool like system where each die is always a success might work better. Each point of defense could be consumed for the round by an attack die -- they'd cancel each other out. Any remaining attack dice would be added together for damage. Lots of ways to modify a system like that.

[Person_Man]

While I appreciate the concept of it, I found than in practice a system like this markedly slows down gameplay whenever people have to roll a skill check, because they have to check and find which different dice they need every time. I don't think this has enough of a benefit to make this slowdown worthwhile.

I concur. Having 1d20 or 2d20 (Advantage/Disadvantage) + Ability Score + Modifiers to resolve all challenging actions is a very good thing. (And to the more that we can make the various possible "Modifiers" as streamlined and intuitive as possible the better). New players in my group have always struggled with the "What am I supposed to roll now?" question, and it dramatically slows down the game.

This is also the reason I strongly dislike Expertise and Skill Dice. They should settle on one single unified mechanic. If they need modifiers that are higher or lower, then they can increase the number of Advantage/Disadvantage dice you can roll, and/or increase Ability Scores modifiers (18 could be +8 instead of +4), and/or put the Class or Trained/Proficient/Skilled bonuses on some sort of coherent scale.

[Grod_The_Giant]

While I appreciate the concept of it, I found than in practice a system like this markedly slows down gameplay whenever people have to roll a skill check, because they have to check and find which different dice they need every time. I don't think this has enough of a benefit to make this slowdown worthwhile.

Meh, it's no worse than "wait, what do I add to this?" Arguably better, since you don't have to reply "BAB plus your Strength modifier plus enhancement bonus plus flanking plus..."

@Fellhammer: While I like the idea of bonus dice, I concur about the mental fatigue thing being an issue. On the one hand, it's one more number than you have to add in previous editions where you could add up your bonuses in advance. On the other, if you don't add up your bonuses in advance, it's a lot simpler.

Skill dice also offer a nice way of handling buffs, now that I think about it. You can have stuff like "Weapon Focus: when making attack rolls, use the next higher skill die." With everything capping at a d12...boom, control, no matter how many splatbooks full of bonus types they release. Easy to remember, too.

[Kurald Galain]

Meh, it's no worse than "wait, what do I add to this?" Arguably better, since you don't have to reply "BAB plus your Strength modifier plus enhancement bonus plus flanking plus..."

Lots of conditional modifiers are also a bad thing, yes. On the other hand, BAB+str+enh doesn't change too often, so for purposes of playing out a combat it's just a single static modifier. For the same reason, weapon damage dice don't bother me: you know your longsword is always 1d8, and that the rogue player uses 1d4 for a dagger doesn't slow down things. This is different from saying that your Diplomacy skill is 1d20+1d8 whereas your Stealth skill is 1d20+2d6.

[Jerthanis]

They're so sure they know what they're doing, but they're creating doubts. The cracks are showing. The emperor is not fully clothed.

This is really true. I'm continuously confused as to why Mike Mearls hasn't been fired yet. He was a lead designer on the edition that split the fanbase and also largely failed in its goal to attract new players, then he was hired to make the game that would undo the damage he did.

And that process is taking him forever, and every update he gives on the progress demonstrates his borderline understanding of the elements he's working with.

It's like hiring a contractor to build you a house. It ends up that it isn't up to code, and you hire the same contractor and continue to pay him for 19 months as he's working to bring it up to code. Meanwhile, all his updates are worrying, like, "We've just started to investigate the foundation for possible issues of being built on a sinkhole." and "Our goal here, to have working electrical outlets is well on its way now that we've accepted that sparking and dimming all the lights when you plug something in is actually a good thing."

I can't help but feel that the d20 is holding the game back -- heck rolls to see if you do anything in a round are something I have grown to dislike.

I mean, it's fine to not succeed at something, but I think games would be better if you help weaken an enemy's defenses even if you don't hurt it.

I was thinking about how the goal of making smaller numbers matter much more would make more sense with a 2d6+modifiers system than with a d20+modifiers game. You'd get more consistent results of experts (+4 or so) very reliably passing DC 10 checks, while untrained people (+0 or -1) would be unlikely to pass such a check, but it would be possible.

But that'll never happen, because a d20 is iconic with the D&D brand, and so the game is never going to abandon it, even if it would be a resoundingly better idea.

[Doug Lampert]

Lots of conditional modifiers are also a bad thing, yes. On the other hand, BAB+str+enh doesn't change too often, so for purposes of playing out a combat it's just a single static modifier. For the same reason, weapon damage dice don't bother me: you know your longsword is always 1d8, and that the rogue player uses 1d4 for a dagger doesn't slow down things. This is different from saying that your Diplomacy skill is 1d20+1d8 whereas your Stealth skill is 1d20+2d6.

I object to skill dice for a somewhat different reason.

My observation is that skill is usually more about MINIMIZING the random element than anything else. A really good bowler or golfer or whatever has a very consistent approach and fairly consistent results. A skilled craftsman measures twice and cuts once, he gets it right the first time so that the peices fit.

Broadly, an expert doesn't neccessarily beat epic DCs in D&D terms, but he doesn't completely blow the routine plays.

In bowling almost anyone can get a lucky strike, but the skilled bowler doesn't put his first ball of the frame in the gutter. In golf anyone able to reach the green in one might get a hole in one, but on a short par three (where the novice might manage that) the skilled golfer will pretty well always at least hits the green on that tee shot, while the novice needs to get lucky to manage even that and will put lots of balls in the sandtrap or rough or the water as well as that shot to the green or lucky hole in one.

If the object of your skill system were to roll LOW, and high skill gave SMALLER dice, then I'd find skill dice reasonable. But if high skill means d20+d12 and low skill means d20+d4 while untrained means d20 then in fact the skilled character screws up far, far too often. His floor is not appreciably higher than anyone else's; and my observation is that in the real world expertise typically has as much or more to do with increasing the floor as raising the ceiling.

[SiuiS]

I've been messing around with this for a custom system I am working on. My concern with Temp HP that refreshes is that adds a lot of subtraction to the game. This is slower than addition, so that increases turn time. Temp HP is going to need to keep increasing as you level (to represent better defense, since you'd be dropping to-hit rolls entirely), this isn't a trivial thing.

Not at all. It's basically damage reduction which goes away for a round if beaten. DR wasn't a bad mechanic. Likewise, the BBeG having like, a +5 on all saves until hit is neat, and so is a floating AC bonus.

It reminds me of a friend's Defiant template, that was basically a +X chunk to all variables, and minimum +100% HP, and any save or die/save or lose effects can be entirely cleared by burning 100% HP. A guy with 5x normal HP can soak four instant deaths before he really has to worry, for example.

But a dice-pool like system where each die is always a success might work better. Each point of defense could be consumed for the round by an attack die -- they'd cancel each other out. Any remaining attack dice would be added together for damage. Lots of ways to modify a system like that.

That's basically how WoD defense works.

Lots of conditional modifiers are also a bad thing, yes. On the other hand, BAB+str+enh doesn't change too often, so for purposes of playing out a combat it's just a single static modifier. For the same reason, weapon damage dice don't bother me: you know your longsword is always 1d8, and that the rogue player uses 1d4 for a dagger doesn't slow down things. This is different from saying that your Diplomacy skill is 1d20+1d8 whereas your Stealth skill is 1d20+2d6.

I disagree, because you have the same phenomenon. Every time your thief goes to climb, it's always d10+3 on top, and every time you go to intimidate its d6+d10+4. Same memorization, but with a string (which is possibly easier to remember because you'll develop a mnemonic from the physical dice).

I object to skill dice for a somewhat different reason.

My observation is that skill is usually more about MINIMIZING the random element than anything else. A really good bowler or golfer or whatever has a very consistent approach and fairly consistent results. A skilled craftsman measures twice and cuts once, he gets it right the first time so that the peices fit.

Broadly, an expert doesn't neccessarily beat epic DCs in D&D terms, but he doesn't completely blow the routine plays.

In bowling almost anyone can get a lucky strike, but the skilled bowler doesn't put his first ball of the frame in the gutter. In golf anyone able to reach the green in one might get a hole in one, but on a short par three (where the novice might manage that) the skilled golfer will pretty well always at least hits the green on that tee shot, while the novice needs to get lucky to manage even that and will put lots of balls in the sandtrap or rough or the water as well as that shot to the green or lucky hole in one.

If the object of your skill system were to roll LOW, and high skill gave SMALLER dice, then I'd find skill dice reasonable. But if high skill means d20+d12 and low skill means d20+d4 while untrained means d20 then in fact the skilled character screws up far, far too often. His floor is not appreciably higher than anyone else's; and my observation is that in the real world expertise typically has as much or more to do with increasing the floor as raising the ceiling.

The floor doesn't raise dramatically, no. That's why we preferred the idea of adding additional dice to each advancement instead of increasing the modifier; because otherwise your minimum is 2+attribute no matter what (3+ for rogues!) and that's silly.

Although its not so bad if the DCs get kicked down a few. Then you really are just achieving decreasing the odds of failure on a routine task of DC 15 which defines the profession.

[Person_Man]

I disagree, because you have the same phenomenon. Every time your thief goes to climb, it's always d10+3 on top, and every time you go to intimidate its d6+d10+4. Same memorization, but with a string (which is possibly easier to remember because you'll develop a mnemonic from the physical dice).

Every time the thief goes to climb it might be 2d20 (minimum 10) + 3 + 1d10, and then when he goes to Intimidate it might be 2d20 (minimum 10) + 2 + 1d6 + 1d10 + 4, and then when he tries to make a Knowledge check it might be 1d20 + nothing, and then when he goes to attack it might be 1d20 + 1 + 2, but then when he tries to Trip an enemy it might be 1d20 + 1 + 2 + 1d4. Literally action could require a slightly different set of dice.

I don't need or want to roll a different set of dice for the sake of rolling a different set of dice. And I can probably accomplish whatever Range and Variance you might want using a simpler unified mechanic.

For example - All rolls are 1d20 + relevant Ability Score bonus (max +5) + 1/2 your class level (if Trained/Proficient). Class abilities/Feats/items/whatever (optimization) can grant or impose Advantage/Disadvantage on various checks. Advantages and Disadvantages cancel each other out or stack, up to a maximum of 3d20. Armor Class/DC/Saves/etc are set at 10ish for mildly challenging tasks, 15ish for hard tasks, 20ish for heroic tasks, and 25ish for superhuman tasks. Or if you're a big fan of high variance (I'm not), you could make all rolls 1d20 + relevant Ability Score bonus (max +5) + 1dX Skill/Expertise die (if Trained/Proficient), with X always being a set number depending on your class level.

Or whatever.

The point is that having a single unified mechanic of any type makes the game easier, and it also allows you to have set Difficulties that are universal for all tasks, and so you always know if getting a result of 20 is meh or super heroic or whatever. And most importantly, it keeps all of the game developers/writers honest. If Mike wants to write X and Bob wants to write Y and Jane wants to write Z, they all know that it needs to be within the same mathematical framework, and they can't break the math by adding new formulas or modifiers.

Which should also lead to better writing in general. I don't need or want 50 different Feats which provide slightly different numerical bonuses. I want 50 different Feats which allow my character to do 50 distinctly different things.

[Kurald Galain]

Unified mechanics are a good thing.

A common criticism of 2E is that checks are sometimes d20-roll-high, sometimes d20-roll-low, sometimes d6 (for initiative) and sometimes d%. That confuses players for no good reason...

...but 5E's proposed mix of rolling 2d20, d20-minimum-of-10, or d20+d6 for various ways of "being better at something", that's needlessly confusing for exactly the same reason. At least 3E and 4E are consistently "d20+mods, roll high", learn from that.

[1337 b4k4]

Unified mechanics are a good thing.

I don't find this to be true. Unified mechanics across a given set of tasks is a good thing, but unified mechanics across an entire system is not necessarily a good thing. This a continuum issue, and at either end is "OMG this is stupid" Consistency for the sake of consistency gives us 3.x's infinite modifiers and 5e's d20 bounded accuracy for combat and skills. As a result of wanting to avoid having "inconsistent" mechanics (d20 to rule them all), WotC is trying to shoehorn variable modifiers into the system in a way that doesn't make sense in order to comply with the bounded accuracy goal. On the other side of the equation, is having a new mechanic for everything, which is needlessly confusing.

There is a balance to be struck and as long as combat is going to be separate from skills, there's no reason why they both have to be tied to the same mechanic. Personally I think unified mechanics across an entire system sells players short. We're all smart enough to understand that different things work differently. It would not be a bad thing for personal skills, opposed actions, social skills, combat etc to each use a different mechanic provided that each set of actions be clearly marked and use the same mechanic.

[Raineh Daze]

There is a balance to be struck and as long as combat is going to be separate from skills, there's no reason why they both have to be tied to the same mechanic. Personally I think unified mechanics across an entire system sells players short.

I can understand that.

We're all smart enough to understand that different things work differently. It would not be a bad thing for personal skills, opposed actions, social skills, combat etc to each use a different mechanic provided that each set of actions be clearly marked and use the same mechanic.

Now you've lost me--two subsets of skills should use different mechanics and opposed rolls should still be a thing?

[Talakeal]

I have tried all sorts of mechanics in my system over the years.

Dice + modifier. Roll over. Roll under. Dice pool. Variable dice size. Different numbers and shapes of dice for all of the above.

I have always found that d20 + modifier vs. difficulty is by far the easiest to use for a multitude of reasons.

At this point my system uses a single d20+modifier mechanic for everything and is far more unified than D&D which still uses a different system for a lot of mechanics (for example damage and HP generation).

After over a decade of trying, I simply find it works better than anything else.

[Kurald Galain]

Consistency for the sake of consistency gives us ... 5e's d20 bounded accuracy for combat and skills.

The problem with BA is not that WOTC is consistent in it; the problem is their implementation it in the first place.

[Drachasor]

Not at all. It's basically damage reduction which goes away for a round if beaten. DR wasn't a bad mechanic. Likewise, the BBeG having like, a +5 on all saves until hit is neat, and so is a floating AC bonus.

It reminds me of a friend's Defiant template, that was basically a +X chunk to all variables, and minimum +100% HP, and any save or die/save or lose effects can be entirely cleared by burning 100% HP. A guy with 5x normal HP can soak four instant deaths before he really has to worry, for example.

Temp HP that refreshes every round instead of an Attack Roll/AC certainly is a workable mechanic. I'm just wary of handling time and subtraction often increases handling time. You'd also have higher Temp HP numbers than you'd normally see with DR -- and probably not in multiple of 5's. There's a massive difference between 15 defense and 10 defense in such a system. You get hit for 5 rounds and that's potentially 25 HP in difference already!

Again, certainly not unworkable -- I thought character sheets could have a number line down the side for Defense to help keep track. That said, I think there might be a simpler system that gives similar results.

But a dice-pool like system where each die is always a success might work better. Each point of defense could be consumed for the round by an attack die -- they'd cancel each other out. Any remaining attack dice would be added together for damage. Lots of ways to modify a system like that.

That's basically how WoD defense works.

Hmm, as I remember it, you roll attack and and the defender rolls defense. Successes are then compared and the difference is damage (or nothing). But it has been..hmm...8 or so years since I've dealt with the system.

I'm talking about something like this:

Defender (D) has a defense of 3. This automatically refreshes every round back up to full. This will remove attack dice in order of highest roll to lowest roll.

He's attacked by Attacker A and Attack B. Let's consider a few scenarios for different attacks:

A: 3d6 attack, B: 2d6

A rolls 3, 4, 5. Each die removes a defense automatically. So D now has 0 defense. There are no 6's, so nothing counting as more than one success. A does no damage.
B rolls 2 and 4. There's no defense opposing now, so B does 6 damage (2+4).

Or

A rolls 3, 4, 6. The 6 counts at 2 successes, so the 3 for Defense removes the 6 and the 4. The remaining 3 does 3 damage.
B rolls 2 and 4, dealing 6 damage.

So there's no whiffing here. Even if B attacks first, B still does something. In fact, B could potentially eliminate all of D's defenses.

There's no particular reason to stick with d6's, though if you might need to change the numbers on what counts as 2 successes.

The point is that this system has a solid floor on how badly you can do. If you roll 4 dice for an attack, then you'll remove at least 4 defense no matter how badly you roll. You never waste a turn due to a bad roll, so what you decide to do always matters on some level.

You can mess around with a system like this in a lot of ways. Damage added after remaining attack dice are added together, damage added per die, damage reduction per die, etc.

This has similarities with dice pool systems, but it is also fairly different, I think. At least, I don't know a system like it. I only thought this up about a week ago, so I haven't done much with it yet. Been busy.


One of the virtues of dropping the attack roll is that it would hopefully result in a system that's easier to manage and does all the things you'd want from a "bounded accuracy" system without the headaches. For instance, if you had like 100 Temp HP or 20 Defense* then an army of 1st level guys is still worrisome. You could handle a bunch on your own, but they can still wear you down even if they only attack for 1d6+1 each. And this naturally encourages people to work together since even a bad roll helps your buddy that goes next. You also never have to worry about a peasant being as good as a hero if they roll luckily and don't need any odd mechanics to enforce this.

Or, to put it another way, bounded accuracy is a nice idea. The problem is that the bind on the random element (d20) is far too weak. The AC system doesn't do you in favors in trying to find a better way.

*Obviously we'd want to avoid rolling 20 dice every attack, so there'd probably be a way to add "fake" dice that just subtract from defense. But this keeps the numbers much lower than temp HP, which is the goal.

[1337 b4k4]

Now you've lost me--two subsets of skills should use different mechanics and opposed rolls should still be a thing?

I said nothing about whether they "should" still be a thing, merely acknowledged that they are and there's no reason for them to be the same mechanic since they are different things

The problem with BA is not that WOTC is consistent in it; the problem is their implementation it in the first place.

I wasn't speaking on the quality of BA in the first place, I was talking about the problem of be being shoehorned into both combat and skills when combat and skills are clearly two different things that should be modeled and behave different ways.

[Stubbazubba]

Is the opportunity cost (~7 seconds every non-vital skill roll)

Let's talk about this first. Have you played a Cortex game, like Smallville or Marvel Heroic Roleplaying? Do you know how much 7 seconds pulls you right out of the moment while you fish for the right dice? At least Cortex makes up for it by having each of your dice come from character-based things like relationships or values or flavorful training, not just "I'm a Climbing expert," which goes a long way to creating a rich, character-driven texture to each roll. In this system, you spend all that time looking up dice, which largely don't contribute to the significance of the act, it's just complexity for complexity's sake.

a system which is within bounds of design oaks, complements the idea of fluff and crunch synergy and is more fun?

This isn't what it actually does, though. Let's set aside the fact that it's nominally within the bounds of design goals for the moment and look at your other two contentions; 1) that this complements the idea of fluff and crunch synergy, and 2) that it's more fun.

There really isn't fluff and crunch synergy. You'd have to roll a whole bunch of skill dice in order to ensure consistency, and that would be cumbersome to total up each time, and leave you with the chance of accidentally rolling a 40+ at level 5 on occasion, which is just ridiculous. If your Skill die is less than a d8, adding another one of equal size isn't really giving you too much of an advantage on average anyway, compared with the weight of the d20 roll. You'd have to have at least 2 d6's to bump the needle very much, on average, and this doesn't even eliminate the possibility of rolling poorly despite your Grandmaster status. When you are among the world's elite climbers, you don't completely fail to climb an average mountain even 10% of the time.

Similarly, when you are a total novice, you don't incidentally out-climb said elite climbers even 5% of the time. You need to have DCs out of reach of the little guy that the big guy can hit, and the big guy has to be unable to fail at most, if not all, of the DCs the little guy can hit. That's fluff and crunch synergy; the novice not hitting way above his weight level, and the master not failing mundane checks. So you increase the DC range and give out larger static bonuses. You make the d20 represent a much smaller variability than what is in the world, and make bonuses static and make them come in meaningful chunks. If there's not a significant difference, statistically, between a novice and a master, then those words do not reflect what they ought to mean, and your rules are in dissonance with your fluff. Ergo, while the static system has its flaws, fluff and crunch dissonance is more of a problem in the multiple skill dice system.

Then let's move on to more fun. Again, it will take additional time to build the right pool each roll, and then more time to add up 4, 5, 6 numbers to get a result. For those who subscribe to the Alexandrian's notion of what role-playing is, that's time they spend not role-playing. Either way, that's extra table-time being taken up each check. And what does it offer in return? Is there interesting context with each of those extra skill dice, or are they merely a physical means to a certain statistical end? And speaking of that statistical end, this does completely obfuscate your odds of success. If you're rolling 2d20k1 + 2d4 + 1d8 + 1d6 + 1 + 2, do you know your odds of success against a DC 30? Neither do I. Now, with a little mental math we can find the expected value (15 + 5 + 4.5 + 3.5 + 1 + 2 = 31), and say yeah, we've got just over a 50% shot, but how about against a DC 25? A DC 35? That's purely the realm of statisticians and calculators, and WotC employs neither. So not only will the players be wholly unable to make on-the-fly judgments about their prospects, but the designers can't possibly hope to make anything even remotely balanced, and all meaning of challenge is reduced to a fool's game. If you have fun in this system, it's in spite of this RNG, not because of it.

This RNG has to contribute so much more than just percentages in order to make up for all of that. I don't think it even has the percentages down. What fantastic new depth to the game does this contribute that makes up for all of that?

[Raineh Daze]

I said nothing about whether they "should" still be a thing, merely acknowledged that they are and there's no reason for them to be the same mechanic since they are different things

I'm a fan of the idea that all skills use one mechanic. I'm a bit confused at the suggestion that two types of skill should use different mechanics. They're all skills.

[Icewraith]

I may have understated this, and I may be oversimplifying, but in a 1d20 + level die (previously referred to as class die)+ (weapon, spell or skill die) the level die is only changed by certain powerful class mechanics, advantage/disadvantage only applies to the d20 based on circumstances (why I refer to it as the "circumstance" die) like flanking, surprise, status effects and only in one direction, and the weapon/spell/skill die is the only one being modified by your opponent's defenses.

Spoiler

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You only have one size level die for all checks (the die size increases as you level), it represents the advantages your experience as an adventurer has given you. Each class gains a static bonus to defenses that scales with level (wearing armor probably changes this interaction for AC a bit) and is tailored to the thematic sctrengths and weaknesses of that class. Magical equipment that enhances a particular defense inflicts item disadvantage on opponents attacking that defense, so defenses are a DC and the amount of disadvantage the attacker has to deal with. (Item disadvantage does not stack)

If class abilities are robust enough that feats adding additional options are unnecessary, feats might instead come in two flavors and add a 1d4 (greater:1d6) to a particular attack. Feat die never have advantage or disadvantage and do not stack. Alternatively, dice feats are their own category, gained at third level and every three levels thereafter. Class ability enhancing feats (metamagic, power/maneuver enhancers) are gained at 1st and levels divisible by five. I really feel like the system needs d20 (circumstance) +level+attack+some other die, level and attack can be maxed out to d12 and some other die needs to stay small. Circumstance die can only shift once in either direction and only attack dice pools fluctuate wildly (up to 5 in either direction). The most skilled characters never roll less than a 4 and can influence the d20 by up to 24 (30), total of 44 (50), and rarely roll less than 14 (15).

Furthermore, instead of subtracting bonuses in your head, you simply remove that number of dice from your skilletc pool. If you drop into disadvantage you have to do slightly more complex math, but in reality all you're doing is putting dice back in once you get down to one die.

...Ability scores! That's what I forgot! That would add some additional complexity since another category of your dice roll would fluctuate (at least when using skills), and up to this point I've been able to limit major fluctuations to one category. However it would give me a solid additional die, with the option of a 1d4 or 1d6 feat die.

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Either way you have a system of strictly bounded accuracy defined along however many levels you like- although a level cap divisible by 5 (minimum of 5) is advisable and allows for either a 20 or 30 level cap. Ooh and get this- in a d20+2 dice system the max level "make it on ten" AC is somewhere between 26 and 28 and a d20+3 dice system it's between 30 and 33 (depending on how much advantage you assume the characters should have on their attack dice). A "make it on ten" AC at low level is in the 15-17 range so players shouldn't be missing "big numbers", especially with the d20+3 dice system.

There's obviously some tweaks to work out, but it handles almost all of the elements in 3.5 and 4e (magic items, bonus stacking, large numbers of static modifiers, splatbook expansions) with a fistful of dice (at worst 2 d20s, 1 class die (2 for barbarians), 1-5 attack dice, and possibly one feat and one attribute die) and slightly more input from the DM (defense DC, advantage/disadvantage, attack dice modifier).

Also note that you in most cases will be using a specific set of attack/skill/spell, attribute, and feat dice in concert, so you probably won't be altering pool size much after the first round of combat

[Raineh Daze]

*Snip*

Now can we have the explanation of why a dedicated 20-30 levels of training has lead to a mostly random improvement where most of the 'getting better' stuff has been to reach a higher cap but still fail at stuff you were doing at the start of your career?

[Stubbazubba]

Personally I think unified mechanics across an entire system sells players short. We're all smart enough to understand that different things work differently. It would not be a bad thing for personal skills, opposed actions, social skills, combat etc to each use a different mechanic provided that each set of actions be clearly marked and use the same mechanic.

So what happens when you want to intimidate someone while fighting? At the very least, the various sub-mechanics you are proposing here need to work on the same frames, even if the contents vary.

More generally, I don't consider the RNG the same thing as a mechanic. A mechanic is how you interpret the result the RNG gives you, and I do think that all the mechanics in a game should use the same RNG. Using d20 + modifiers vs. DC does in no way prevent you from modeling combat, chases, social encounters, trap disarming, etc., in different and interesting ways, it just keeps the meta-game overhead from getting out of control.

[Person_Man]

I don't find this to be true. Unified mechanics across a given set of tasks is a good thing, but unified mechanics across an entire system is not necessarily a good thing. This a continuum issue, and at either end is "OMG this is stupid" Consistency for the sake of consistency gives us 3.x's infinite modifiers and 5e's d20 bounded accuracy for combat and skills. As a result of wanting to avoid having "inconsistent" mechanics (d20 to rule them all), WotC is trying to shoehorn variable modifiers into the system in a way that doesn't make sense in order to comply with the bounded accuracy goal. On the other side of the equation, is having a new mechanic for everything, which is needlessly confusing.

There is a balance to be struck and as long as combat is going to be separate from skills, there's no reason why they both have to be tied to the same mechanic. Personally I think unified mechanics across an entire system sells players short. We're all smart enough to understand that different things work differently. It would not be a bad thing for personal skills, opposed actions, social skills, combat etc to each use a different mechanic provided that each set of actions be clearly marked and use the same mechanic.

So I'd be fine with some diversity of resolution mechanics, as long as it was applied consistently within said mechanics.

For example, you could have 3 areas of the game, Combat/Gamist (Feats), Exploration/Simulationist (Skills), and Roleplaying/Narrative (Traits), with each class granting you different tracks or disciplines or lists or whatever of each.

Each section can be a game onto itself, with a different system for resolving challenging actions. You could use a streamlined 3.5/4E hybrid for Combat, FATE for Exploration, and Pendragon for Roleplaying. Have each sub-game be excellent in its own way.

But within each, you'll still need some sort of simple universal mechanic to resolve things, otherwise the game would just become impossible for new players to learn, and impossible for writers to create supplementary materials without breaking the math.

[Icewraith]

Well since you're rolling 3-4 dice and can stack up large amounts of advantage on one of them and small amounts of advantage on the d20, you end up with a bell curve that should result in a more consistent success rate. Missing the really easy dcs should require rolling low on most of the dice, which should be rare- especially since the higher level you are the more weight you put on one of the die, and I fully expect the attack die to be one of the larger die.

[1337 b4k4]

I'm a fan of the idea that all skills use one mechanic. I'm a bit confused at the suggestion that two types of skill should use different mechanics. They're all skills.

It all depends. Let's take the example of a social skill (say argument/oration) vs an individual skill (like climbing a cliff). A good oration / argument has often been likened to a battle of minds, and for a good many such situations, you could very easily model it as such. In fact, that has long been a suggestion for handling persuasion / bluff skills in D&D and is how Burning Wheel handles them as well.

By comparison while we sometimes refer to cliff climbers as having "conquered" the obstacle, it generally would not work well to model climbing a cliff as a battle between you and the cliff. You could do it, and you could even do it in a way that works mathematically, but that doesn't make it the best mechanic for modeling that skill.

That isn't to say there isn't a way were they could both be modeled using the same mechanic, or that they shouldn't be modeled using the same mechanic. For example, Mg Traveller rolls all skills/actions (including combat) into a single 2d6 >=8 mechanic, which works, but does require a more heavy reliance on DM adjudication than I feel most people here are comfortable with. It could go either way, but my point is that having different mechanics for them is not necessarily a bad thing provided they are clearly marked and within each subset, the same mechanic is used.

So what happens when you want to intimidate someone while fighting? At the very least, the various sub-mechanics you are proposing here need to work on the same frames, even if the contents vary.

Sure, but interaction between mechanics says nothing about whether they should be different or not. What happens in 3e when you want to intimidate someone while fighting? Bother are d20 + mods > Target Number roll mechanics but that tells you nothing about how they interact with one another.

More generally, I don't consider the RNG the same thing as a mechanic. A mechanic is how you interpret the result the RNG gives you,

This is only part of the equation. A mechanic is the RNG + The interpretation. The probability curve your RNG gives you directly impacts how that RNG can and will be interpreted. I discuss this here though at the time I was talking about fluff vs mechanics, but if you substitute mechanics for fluff and RNG for mechanics, the argument still holds.

I do think that all the mechanics in a game should use the same RNG. Using d20 + modifiers vs. DC does in no way prevent you from modeling combat, chases, social encounters, trap disarming, etc., in different and interesting ways, it just keeps the meta-game overhead from getting out of control.

It depends on what you want to model. Again, consistency for consistency's sake leads to its own problems. See the link above, 4 different RNGs which would lend themselves to 4 different modes of modeling. d20 + mods vs DC by definition prevents you from modeling anything that works on a bell curve. Additionally, rolling d20 + Mods prevents me from modeling anything that has variances in any step that isn't a multiple of 5%.

So I'd be fine with some diversity of resolution mechanics, as long as it was applied consistently within said mechanics.

...

But within each, you'll still need some sort of simple universal mechanic to resolve things, otherwise the game would just become impossible for new players to learn, and impossible for writers to create supplementary materials without breaking the math.

I must have been unclear because this was exactly what I've been saying for the past few posts.

[Stubbazubba]

This is only part of the equation. A mechanic is the RNG + The interpretation. The probability curve your RNG gives you directly impacts how that RNG can and will be interpreted.

Or more accurately, how often it will be interpreted a given way, but I think we're on the same page here.

I discuss this here though at the time I was talking about fluff vs mechanics, but if you substitute mechanics for fluff and RNG for mechanics, the argument still holds.

Good article, and I agree that the crunch is the fluff, but I don't think the relationship between fluff and mechanics works the same as that between the RNG and the mechanics, as in, the RNG is not the mechanics (not necessarily). You see, the RNG, at its core, is really just determining frequency. How often do you succeed, how often do you fail, how often do you succeed or fail in one of these given degrees. That's all it does. Now, that has a huge effect on how the game plays, as you point out in your article, or the actual fluff that is realized in the game, but it doesn't necessarily have that same causative effect on how the mechanic works.

Let's say one game uses d20 + modifiers while another uses d6 dicepools, 4+ is a Hit. You could adapt the mechanics of D&D combat or 4e Skill Challenges to either of these RNGs and either would work, so long as you adjust the DCs and such to account for the differences in frequency. The mechanics would make it feel very similar, and so long as you're pegging the frequencies about right, it would play out very similarly. The reason for that is because D&D operates on a very simple pass/fail system. D&D is RNG-agnostic.

There are some mechanics that are tied to their RNG, however: Cortex/Cortex+ games have you form a pool of dice of varying sizes, roll them all, your total is that of the highest 2 together (i.e. to-hit), and your effect is the largest size die left over (i.e. damage), though you can intentionally use a smaller die in your total in order to leave a larger effect die, and often you can use multiple effect dice. So your total will be a number, but your effect is a die size (d4-d12). Getting all of this from one roll is kind of nice, and there's a bit of a trade-off where you want your high numbers in your total but your larger dice for your effect, and it creates an interesting dice-manipulation game. d20 + Modifiers can't do all of that, it needs a separate to-hit and damage roll (or to combine it into a degrees of success), but there simply isn't the same trade-offs going on without cumbersome workarounds. In this and a few other, similar instances the mechanics determine the RNG, but not the other way around.

It depends on what you want to model. Again, consistency for consistency's sake leads to its own problems. See the link above, 4 different RNGs which would lend themselves to 4 different modes of modeling. d20 + mods vs DC by definition prevents you from modeling anything that works on a bell curve. Additionally, rolling d20 + Mods prevents me from modeling anything that has variances in any step that isn't a multiple of 5%.

Yes, the RNG does determine frequencies and how they relate to each other, but in RPGs, we typically don't model actual things that happen on a bell curve. I mean, what character action or interaction would actually necessitate a bell curve in order to work appropriately? And for that skill, what do we lose by approximating it on a flat RNG like a d20? And what skill is ruined if you only get 35% or 65% instead of 1/3 or 2/3 right on the head?

Meanwhile, by using a more accurate RNG, you're losing out on the transparency of the d20 (very easy to calculate odds of success), as well as the fact that you typically only have one math operation to do to get your success, then an instant comparison to know success/failure (instead of adding together the results of multiple dice). It's quick, easy, intuitive, and fades into the background of play, which can't be said for other RNGs, like Cortex+, where about 1/3 of the game is working the RNG. It gets out of the way of the game, which should be a goal in a game of sustained make-believe.