Topic: Do characters know they resisted?

[Jengada]

I'm curious, GMs, when a character resists a spell in your game, do they know something happened? I haven't found anything in RM2 (or RMSS) that says one way or the other.

[damage]

Maybe.

If they resist a spell, I give them an alertness roll to see if they realize they're resisted. That might get bonuses if they made their resistance roll by a lot, or if they can actually see the Channelling caster of the Evil Dark God X waving his hands in the air, pointing at them and shouting to his god to smite the unbeliever, for instance.

If a player says that they're being hyper-vigilant and expect to be targeted by hostile spells, I make it an Observation roll instead of Alertness. This can lead to some very funny situations when a player completely blows their roll and gets a Spectacular Failure...

If I tell the player that they do realize they're resisted a spell, then next questions are invariably "Do I know who cast it?" and "Do I know what the spell was?". I tend to combine these into a single Spell Lore roll.

[Hurin]

Playing in Kulthea (Shadow World) means spells by default have color halos. So, yes.

Playing RMU means having rules about how to hide you are casting a spell (by using spell Trickery skill or by taking penalties for not making sounds, using gestures, etc), so, yes there too.

[rdanhenry]

There is a difference between knowing that you have been the target of a spell and knowing that some particular person was just casting a spell. Indeed, you might think that the caster was someone who was openly casting something innocent, while a malicious spell-casting was being done too subtly to notice. (One reason to be a Mentalist.)
A look at RM2 Spell Law appears to have it mute on the question, but RMU is more clear on the matter (and follows RMSS in most, if not all, of this). Informational spells that affect an individual have a chance of being noticed, based on RR (and the RR is primarily for this purpose, with only success by 50 or more preventing the spell from succeeding). The willing-target text for Utility spells indicates that the target must take on trust what spell the caster is using. Given that Informational spells in general can have a very light touch (scanning for active magic, for example, is almost at the "passive sensor" level), I would say that Force spells would be obvious, in so far as you would feel some influence on your aura, though (going by the Utility spell rule), what the spell was is probably not immediately obvious, though successful observational type skill use might note a moment of drowsiness from a Sleep spell, for example. You would not necessarily have any idea where it was cast from, although if there is one stranger in a pointy hat present, you make make assumptions. Elemental spells, of course, are generally quite flashy, and those that might be considered exceptions (if a Deflection or Bladeturn field visible other than an unnatural redirection of the weapon is a question left for the GM) are not targeting individuals. It may be obvious where these originate (Bolts and Balls, for example), or they may appear at some distance from the caster (e.g., most Illusions) and be of uncertain origin.

[Jengada]

In my game today, I found myself telling a player who resisted two spells (1) "You feel a sense that someone just targeted you, but you're not sure what it was." and (2) "You feel that sense again, but it's more intense." I did it out of reflex, and realized I haven't always done this. Nor have I given NPCs a sense they've been targeted and resisted. That's what prompted the question, and it's good to see that I wasn't totally forgetting some piece of RM2 rules (RMU notwithstanding.)
I think I'll ask my players whether they prefer the "you sense it" or being oblivious.

[Amano]

I like the idea of a perception check to notice “a moment of drowsiness” from a failed sleep spell or any similar explanations a gm can think of for other spells. In general, I think some kind of perception check should be required to notice a resisted spell that a character did not otherwise know was being cast on them.

As far as noticing who cast the spell, RMU beta says

“If the caster is not using his hands or voice to cast with, taking the Subtlety penalty means that only someone specifically observing the caster has a chance to notice the casting as an Absurd maneuver. If the caster is using gestures or voice, the difficulty is Very Hard for individual observation and Absurd for general observation. Penalties from Subtlety, Hands, and Voice can be reduced via the Magical Expertise: Spell Trickery skill.”

Note that the above difficulties are for casting while taking the subtlety penalty. How difficult it is to notice that a spell is being cast openly isn’t specified but I would suggest not very. Noticing that a spell is being cast openly shouldn’t be any more difficult than noticing any other unsubtle action. Some GMs (and the beta rules) require perception checks to know what is happening outside of their immediate surroundings in melee, many don’t.

[rdanhenry]

Also, allowing the character to know they were subject to a spell effect allows the player to roll the RR without having to keep player and character knowledge separate.

[jdale]

100% agree with Dan.

For identifying what the spell was, I would generally keep things very vague. Spell Lore would be appropriate if they want to identify precisely what it was. Perception might give some useful clues. On the other hand, you can use the description to build tension and terrify your players. "You feel a chill run down your spine" vs "you feel a wrenching tug upon your very soul, but it is not quite strong enough to rip it away from your body."

[Cory Magel]

Just randomly tell your players to roll their dice once in a while for no reason.  This way you can have the players roll for things like RR's themselves without KNOWING.
From there, I'd say it depends on how well the character resisted.  The more they resisted by the better chance they'd have more information to work with.

[Jengada]

Just randomly tell your players to roll their dice once in a while for no reason.  This way you can have the players roll for things like RR's themselves without KNOWING.
From there, I'd say it depends on how well the character resisted.  The more they resisted by the better chance they'd have more information to work with.

This is pretty much my approach. I don't want new skills for sneaky casting, or for sensing the details. What's interesting is that, as you propose, I figured that rolling well above the minimum for the RR meant they'd notice, a near-miss would yield nothing. But the main party spell-caster (and target of the 2 spells that prompted my OP) wrote back and likes the opposite approach - near miss means they notice, but really good roll means they totally blew it out of the water and don't even notice. Now I can see that progression, too.

[pastaav]

Asking the players to do rolls without explanation and saving the result for an upcoming sneaky spell situation can be one way to make the players roll their resistance without alerting them somebody is targeting them.

[Spectre771]

It is situational.  Depends on the spell, the scene.

[intothatdarkness]

It is situational.  Depends on the spell, the scene.

This. Along with spell, I'd sometimes factor in Realm.

[intothatdarkness]

Asking the players to do rolls without explanation and saving the result for an upcoming sneaky spell situation can be one way to make the players roll their resistance without alerting them somebody is targeting them.

There was an older system (it might have been Behind Enemy Lines, but I don't remember for sure) that actually had players make a series of rolls at the start of each session and hand them to the GM for use in those situations. I do know Behind Enemy Lines had an interesting mechanic for obscuring rolls: it was d6 based, so the players would make their skill or senses rolls as normal. Then the GM rolled and added his result to what the player rolled, subtracting 18 (it was 3d6 based) if the total was above 18. That way it was possible for a player to actually MAKE a roll they thought they'd missed. A bit clunky at times, but it tossed in some uncertainty when they were looking for booby traps or ambushes...

[Cory Magel]

This is pretty much my approach. I don't want new skills for sneaky casting, or for sensing the details. What's interesting is that, as you propose, I figured that rolling well above the minimum for the RR meant they'd notice, a near-miss would yield nothing. But the main party spell-caster (and target of the 2 spells that prompted my OP) wrote back and likes the opposite approach - near miss means they notice, but really good roll means they totally blew it out of the water and don't even notice. Now I can see that progression, too.

lol... I kinda like that.  A bit like if you barely made it through a flu alive, obviously you knew you were in trouble. But if it peters out before you even had a sniffle you would never have even known.

[Jengada]

Asking the players to do rolls without explanation and saving the result for an upcoming sneaky spell situation can be one way to make the players roll their resistance without alerting them somebody is targeting them.

There was an older system (it might have been Behind Enemy Lines, but I don't remember for sure) that actually had players make a series of rolls at the start of each session and hand them to the GM for use in those situations. I do know Behind Enemy Lines had an interesting mechanic for obscuring rolls: it was d6 based, so the players would make their skill or senses rolls as normal. Then the GM rolled and added his result to what the player rolled, subtracting 18 (it was 3d6 based) if the total was above 18. That way it was possible for a player to actually MAKE a roll they thought they'd missed. A bit clunky at times, but it tossed in some uncertainty when they were looking for booby traps or ambushes...

I've often done the random rolls. The trick comes with knowing all of their bonuses. I have enough book-keeping back-screen, so I don't keep copies of their sheets anymore. I have also come to really trust my players to play honestly, even if there's player knowledge that's not character knowledge.
A mechanic I've also used, but not since Zoom-times, was to have the players roll 4d10 instead of d%. They show me the 4 dice, I secretly pick two, and use those for their roll. They know they rolled something, but rarely have a sense of what it was right away.

[intothatdarkness]

Asking the players to do rolls without explanation and saving the result for an upcoming sneaky spell situation can be one way to make the players roll their resistance without alerting them somebody is targeting them.

There was an older system (it might have been Behind Enemy Lines, but I don't remember for sure) that actually had players make a series of rolls at the start of each session and hand them to the GM for use in those situations. I do know Behind Enemy Lines had an interesting mechanic for obscuring rolls: it was d6 based, so the players would make their skill or senses rolls as normal. Then the GM rolled and added his result to what the player rolled, subtracting 18 (it was 3d6 based) if the total was above 18. That way it was possible for a player to actually MAKE a roll they thought they'd missed. A bit clunky at times, but it tossed in some uncertainty when they were looking for booby traps or ambushes...

I've often done the random rolls. The trick comes with knowing all of their bonuses. I have enough book-keeping back-screen, so I don't keep copies of their sheets anymore. I have also come to really trust my players to play honestly, even if there's player knowledge that's not character knowledge.
A mechanic I've also used, but not since Zoom-times, was to have the players roll 4d10 instead of d%. They show me the 4 dice, I secretly pick two, and use those for their roll. They know they rolled something, but rarely have a sense of what it was right away.

I usually just note the main bonuses such rolls would be made against (Perception being the most common) and go from there. Since we modified skills pretty heavily for my setting, it wasn't hard to know which skills would be used in these situations. At one point I tried having them add their own bonuses to the rolls when they made them, but it ended up being easier for me to just track their bonuses.