Topic: Question about the Fumble table

[Ruffie]

Hi,

Long time lurker (you guys helpen me out a bunch without knowing it), first time posters.
We play RMSS with RMFRP for the spell lists.

During our last session we encountered a bit of a problem with one of the fumble rules. Our mage fumbled and the result reads: "Roll on the fumble table (check), add 3x all the mods from the list (next page)."

The problem arrises when our mage cast the spell without preparation. This gave him a -15 to the spell casting but would it also give him a -15 (or -45) to the fumble table?

Hopefully you guys can help us with this. Also, english is not my first language so please forgive me if I make mistakes in grammar.

Gr

Marcel

[jdale]

If it gave him a -15 on the casting roll, the intent is it gives him +45 on the fumble table.

[Ruffie]

But wouldn't that mean that there would be a dip in the progression?

0 rounds of prep: -15 so +45 on the fumble
1 round of prep : +0 so +0
2 rounds of prep: +5 so +15
Logical

but...at 9 round he is at +25 on the roll so that would give a +75

My 'problem' is the dip between 0 rounds and the rest.

[jdale]

So, I think the intent is that things that give penalties increase the fumble severity, but things that give bonuses reduce the fumble severity. That's not actually what RMSS says though, since it just says to add the modifiers. But RMFRP which is largely the same system says to subtract those modifiers which means casting penalties increase the fumble roll, while casting bonuses decrease the fumble roll. I would go with the latter but I'm not finding any official ruling that clarifies that.

[OLF, i.e. Olf Le Fol]

All of this comes from RM2's rules about ESF, though, whence you may not decrease the fumble roll, as you add thrice the ESF and the ESF may only be positive (and was an additional roll to the spellcasting roll).

[jdale]

The RMSS and RMFRP tables don't have that restriction, they just say you add (RMSS) or subtract (RMFRP) the modifiers. I suspect the idea was that it only applied to the penalties so when RMSS says "add" they mean treat them as positive values whereas RMFRP is mathematically correct especially if you are using the total of all the modifiers. Could be clearer though.

[Majyk]

Correct.

The x3 was specifically a modifier set to any penalties, not bonuses(boni?).

So anything that was “bad”(less than full casting rounds based off of spell Class-I, II, III, IV; using less hands/voice; wearing restrictive materials/armours) is counteracted by “good” boni(taking longer to cast, extra hands; louder voice).

If one fumbles the SCSM, like your Mage, you then triple *just* the negative mods and add them to a d% looking at the Spell Failure chart that references whether it was an Attack Spell or Non-Attack Spell.

No previous positive boni are used to alter this roll, only the negative ones.

[Ruffie]

Thank you all for the help. I'll talk it over with our party and above arguments help. Don't know if we'll change it right away or when we change GM in 2 sessions.

Thank you all again,