Topic: Ambush and 66

[Dreven1]

Only Rogues, Thieves and Magents. 

[Ecthelion]

Only Rogues, Thieves and Magents. 

Yes, for others the skill is often too expensive  . But, even in the case of Thieves, Ambush gets rarely developed in our group. The reason is that the skill is seldom useful. You need to get behind your victim unnoticed and it must make a difference whether the victim is killed with one strike or not. Especially the latter reduces the usefulness tremendously because, if it's OK that a second or third attack is required to kill the victim, then it's perfectly OK to just get behind the opponent and attack him normally without Ambush. The +55 OB for a surprise attack from behind, coupled with the attacker's OB is usually enough to get a 150 result on the attack table, which will usually result in a severe wound.

Crippling the skill even more, like you suggested, and not allowing a modification up or down to the 66 result would make the skill almost useless. For e.g. a Magent it's madness to invest 100 DPs or more into 20 ranks of Ambush when all it earns him is a ~40% chance for a kill with an E-critical compared to the normal ~20%. With the official Ambush rules he at least gets a chance of ~55% with these 20 ranks.

Did you actually have problems with Ambush being used too often and/or being too deadly using the official rules?

[Dreven1]

Yes we did... both my and another GM in the same city.  We both adopted this rule because it was too easy for a sneaky type level 1 character to one shot an "unaware" level 10 mob. (this equates to a campain wrecker)

So... removing the "move into or out of a natural 66" corrected this...everything became more even - I disagree that it makes it useless, it's just more balanced this way. 

I am all about balance.  If a creature is too powerful at the same level of the characters I will scale it back... if the characters are too powerful for the same level of the mobs then they are out of balance.

I had a level 8 thief sneak in and "assassinate" one of the party members whilst they were in camp.  The thief was nothing special ...she just had 18 ranks in ambush and a good stalk/hide.  They failed their perceptions and she "one shotted" a party member and then got away...
There was an outcry that I purposefully set THAT character up to die...which was wrong... it was random who she attacked.  This was because they had stolen from a very rich noble, he then - of course - hired a tracker/assassin to kill one of them...or all of them.  Oh, and they were all 10th too... it was so bad that I didn't even have her come back and try to take out the others...I felt bad and felt like it was a mistake.  At that point we all agreed that moving into or out of a 66 is a BAD idea for both mobs and players.
TRUST me, I don't make any house rules until I thoroughly discuss it with other GM's and my players.
So, after that we just all agree that moving into or out of  a 66 is just a bad idea. 
Drev

[rdanhenry]

10th level party and they didn't have precautions against sneaking into their camp? After angering someone who can afford to send assassins after them? They got what they deserved.

[markc]

   Every group is different and that is one of the reasons I like RM. In that you can adjust rules and still have a great game or adjust rules to fit a game style you like and want to play.


Dreven1;
IMHO you did a great job asking your players what they thought and what they wanted to do with the rules. Again IMHO it is fine if a group wants to change rules as long as everyone knows what is going on and why the change is being made. It also might require some adjustments in PC's as their focus might need to be changed.

MDC

[Dreven1]

10th level party and they didn't have precautions against sneaking into their camp? After angering someone who can afford to send assassins after them? They got what they deserved.

Yup they tried (but failed their Sense Ambush, Alertness, Observation).... it was all around a very bad time... 

Also, thanks markc!! I never want to be unfair...

[Marc R]

I think it's worth mentioning two GMing concepts.

"goose and gander"
The Rules apply equally to everyone. If you remove the ability to push Ambush to 66 (or 99/00) then the PCs should realize that this means that they will less likely get stabbed in the lung from ambush and killed. . . .but that they will find it harder to Ambush foes. . .so the game gets all around somewhat less deadly. I would be explicit when house modifying the rules to make it clear that this is the case.

and to totally contradict that

"Heroic vs Simulation"
The rules as written, and generally the advice around here, will stick to the simulation approach of the "goose and gander" guideline above. . .the rules apply equally to everyone. . .but some GMs choose to violate the G&G for a more heroic feel to play. . .so that only the PCs, or only PCs and selected high end NPCs, get an exception to the rules. . .i.e. PCs can modify ambush to 66/99/00, but NPCs cannot. . .this will bias play in favor of the PCs without actually cheating the die rolls. Again though, I'd explicitly lay this out to the players.

[pastaav]

My thought is that the modification to 66 result is pretty much essential if you want any feel of reality. One of the hard things to explain about RM combat is that the criticals are random. Most people have inclination to think "why can't I aim for his head when I know he has no helmet, random critical hit on his arm sucks". When you really sit down and explain things to them and ask why not defender who knows he has no helmet should protect it more they usually get it. Often I also talk about about the character taking the best opportunity given. To deliver a serious blow to the arm is better than failing to injure the enemy at all.

The case when the above breaks down is in a ambush situation. Rolling a 150 attack after a total surprise and still ending with +3 concussion hits flashy move but no contact totally breaks the gaming experience. In some gaming styles the deadliness of assassins might be an issue, but I humbly suggest that there are loads of other stuff that can be used to balance stuff.

In my game the art of assassination is really not about if you can kill the enemy, but if you can get away with it. Hiring assassins is expensive since you either need a Magent or find a assassin that can escape and being impossible to find. Trouble is just that the foreign assassins attract attention and even if you find such the plenty of spells available to determine what happened, something that makes assassination attempts risky.     

[Grinnen Baeritt]

Never been keen on the "66" result either as a Player or Referee, much prefer high is always best.

So my answer would be no.

However, I might allow a successful use to modify the Critical chance when using the Ambush skill in a "normal strike" instead of a classic Ambush. I'd only allow this if the attacker had any sort of positional advantage over the target by allowing the attacker to replace thier weapon skill with thier ambush skill (The ambush skill being limited by the wapon skill). This, at least, brings the skill into play more often.

[Marc R]

It's a choice GMs make, but as far as I know, the RAW is that 66 is a valid place to move the result via ambush.