Comments on: Luck Be a Lady Tonight

By: roborus

roborus — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 01:35:00 +0000

This is one of the most psychologically intriguing aspects of gaming, specifically with “fair dice”. Chronic bad luck suggests that what we believe to be random is, in fact, not. And I’m claiming to know enough about the universe to be certain that good and bad luck don’t exist (as evidence makes compelling arguments) – but it is a fascinating conundrum.

As for 4e, LFR handles it by letting you pay 500gps to get resurrected. A similar approach can be adopted for any sufficiently high fantasy setting. But that really doesn’t diffuse the frustration of rolling poorly several for an extended streak.

The luck mechanic of Fighting Fantasy is a nice one, and I’ll be interested in using your application of it. While I enjoy randomness (even the bad kind), it is nice to have something to break the streak.

By: Stuart

Stuart — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 12:51:31 +0000

In the case of attacking the Dragon it might allow the characters to burn their resources (Luck Point) and retreat. It’s still a loss, just not a game ending one. Of course a single re-roll might not be enough to save a character from an angry Dragon either. It certainly doesn’t change the in-game effect of it being a bad choice.

The examples of the Spider and Frog attacks are a bit different. In neither case was it as clearly a “bad” choice as disturbing a dragon.

The mechanic isn’t about removing the effects of bad choices – it’s about shifting things from a purely luck based resolution system to one where players have the option to use up a finite pool of resources.

Luck points or Karma are found in other systems I’ve played like like Shadowrun, Marvel Superheroes, Fighting Fantasy – so it’s not a completely novel idea I’m suggesting.

By: Tales of the Rambling Bumblers » Blog Archive » Karma Points, or Payback is a Botch

Fri, 19 Jun 2009 03:30:44 +0000

[...] discussion over at Robertson Games about using Luck points or the like to reduce the impact of a series of bad [...]

By: Joshua

Joshua — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 02:44:54 +0000

@Stuart – yeah, I don’t really get that. If it’s unacceptable that attacking the sleeping dragon results in a TPK, I don’t see exactly why it’s better if the TPK happens only after all the PCs have gotten to spend a Luck point, which still seems quite likely even if it doesn’t happen in a single round. It’s still the one bad choice that doomed the party. And I definitely don’t see it as better for the players to be weighing attacking the dragon and considering that they’ll certainly survive the first breath attack, even if it costs them a luck point each. To the extent that the game is about making good or bad choices, that seems to me to subsidize (as it were) the bad choices. I don’t think Luck points and the like solve the problem: eventually the party will have run out of them and you’ll still be faced with the dilemma that bad decisions and/or bad die rolls will kill them and the players will be bummed; in the meantime the party is encouraged to engage in reckless behavior.

By: Stuart

Stuart — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 00:01:04 +0000

@Zzarchov: It all depends on the type of game you’re looking for. We played Dungeonquest and had characters dying in the first turn.

@Timeshadows: I don’t subscribe to that theory. I don’t think it’s a very good way of breaking down game styles… at least not for me.

By: Stuart

Stuart — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 23:37:10 +0000

@Joshua: I think there’s a happy medium between 1 wrong choice = death and complete script immunity. The examples given were all cases of a single bad choice followed by a run of bad luck ending the character and / or game. I’d prefer to see it take more than one bad choice to get to that point.

By: Timeshdows

Timeshdows — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:59:23 +0000

I am also of the mind that Luck/Fate/Destiny pts. are, in general, less than helpful. I say that after having run several different game systems with some mechanic like that.

Anything else that I could say would require more knowledge of your players and your GMing style and intent. It does seem that you follow a more ‘narrativist’ path than one of a ‘gamist’.

Best,

By: Zzarchov

Zzarchov — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 21:24:55 +0000

I would stipulate failure and reversal are ALREADY a part of the game.

The whole notion of a die roll itself boils down to a chance you won’t die from the poor choice you made. The spider MIGHT miss instead of just automatically hitting once you walked into the room without checking.

I don’t think it changes anything except the prevalence of one bad roll. Which given how many zany adventures characters go through they will always die in some stupid way. Even the most grizzled veterans haven’t slain over a hundren men in hand to hand combat in the same manner as a 15th level character.

By: Joshua

Joshua — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 20:32:39 +0000

At least in the examples you gave, it was the bad choice that killed them…the bad luck was at most a contributing factor. The “luck” mechanism you propose is essentially one of letting them get away with bad choices. It may be that’s required for everybody to have fun, but if that’s the case personally I’d rather do it through explicit script immunity. That is, in most of my games I actually tell the players the characters won’t die no matter what the dice say unless that’s what they want to happen or they do something blatantly suicidal.
Look at it this way: there’s nothing that would prevent the GM and players from mutually agreeing to retcon the death away. “Ok, let’s resume from before you attacked the sleeping dragon. What do you do?” The purpose of having a game mechanic that the players can call on to accomplish that seems to be to encourage the players to rely on being able to retcon in the ordinary course of things and be able to gauge exactly how many times more they can get away with it, rather than having to propose and get buy-in to revising the “unlucky” event each time. Failure and its reversal becomes an intrinsic part of the game, and part of the planning process, rather than an extraordinary action taken once in a great while to prevent the campaign from crashing.

By: Zzarchov

Zzarchov — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 19:50:58 +0000

I use fate and destiny points for what you are describing.

Fate points are easy to stockpile and get, you gain them for adhering to trope, doing spectacular things, witty lines, being voted MVP, etc. Rolling for “New Fate” at the end of a session is a big dose of fun.

They allow you to : Re-roll a die or set of dice
Gain back some Luck Points (Hit Points to D&D)
Add something plausible to the scene
(ie, declare there is a suitable club behind
the bar without needing to check for one first)

And then GM assigned “Destiny Points” that allow you to:
Declare the results of a without rolling
Regain all Luck points (hit points)
Deus Ex Machina to save the day

The net result being the same, luck is important, but if you play the game to everyones enjoyment, you can overlook a few examples of bad luck without needing constant GM Fiat or suspension of disbelief.