Author Topic: Perception, Stalk/Hide, Ambush, and Sense Ambush/Assassination  (Read 5307 times)

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Offline Peter R

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Re: Perception, Stalk/Hide, Ambush, and Sense Ambush/Assassination
« Reply #20 on: September 11, 2016, 10:13:31 AM »
(though if someone could come up with an easy way to make them work more passively I would love that).
I don't have my players make those skills rolls. I make them, often long before the start of the game while I am planning the session. If the character succeeds then at the right time I will pass the player a note or such. If they fail then the characters walk blindly into the trap.

Not asking for the skill roll stops any potential meta gaming just off the back of asking for that particular skill.

Another thing you can do if your players really want to make all rolls for their characters is to get them to make 5 rolls before the game; then you roll randomly to see which one is used.

All my players make 10 rolls before we start each session for me for just this sort of situation. I find checking the sense ambush at the plotting stage stops the dice rolling interfering with the role play and story.
Again, more pre-game work which itself is not a game breaker for me, but the fact that you still need to modify these rolls due to situation and then maybe random which one you use at which time, means you might has well just roll the check yourself. By having a few of the more pertinent skills of the PCs written down you can do that yourself without them knowing anything is up. Or you can do what some GMs do and have them randomly roll for no particular reason to keep them guessing. All of it entails more work for the GM, who is already overworked, so I would prefer something faster and easier, like a passive perception vs passive difficulty. Or, just dictate it; if you want them to notice something, they do, if not then they don't, and go from there.

I generally don't modify for difficulty if I am doing this at the plotting stage or more accurately I factor that in as I know what the lighting will be and I know the relative skill of the assailants etc. Once I check to see if the passive perception worked or not I leave it be at that result. If the player suddenly decides to do something different to the norm such as suddenly all buying the newest brightest lanterns then yes in those few rare conditions I will roll again.

For me this works.
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Offline arakish

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Re: Perception, Stalk/Hide, Ambush, and Sense Ambush/Assassination
« Reply #21 on: September 21, 2016, 08:57:39 AM »
One thing I have used for Skill vs. Skill is to use an RR method.  The one who makes the RR by the most wins.  If both fail, then nothing happens.

I know, stupid, but it seemed to work.

rmfr

That's actually a pretty interesting convention to use.  Both players succeeded at the intended tack so who should win the desired outcome?  The one who did it better has the edge/advantage and therefore gets the desired outcome.  If one player fails the roll, then success to the other player, or as you said, both fail then nothing happens.  I think I'm going to give this a go at the next session we do, hopefully this weekend.

Let me know how it works for you.  I simply tried to figure a way to simplify the Skill vs. Skill thing.  I don't even remember the RAW about this, but do remember they were more complicated than I wanted (read as slowing down the role playing).

rmfr
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Offline r0bperry

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Re: Perception, Stalk/Hide, Ambush, and Sense Ambush/Assassination
« Reply #22 on: November 24, 2020, 10:23:42 AM »
The only problem I see using a RR table to determine the success or failure of a skill vs skill check like Stalk/Hide vs Perception is that RR is basically level vs level. If both are of the same level then the target is 50. You could modify it I guess with each one's skill at the task. But if you do that then using the RR table is moot since it comes back to just an opposed skill check.