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Post by doctorrules on May 11, 2015 20:06:20 GMT
Hello all
It took quite a while, but I finally got a group and got to play the Doctor Who RPG. We played our first adventure, 2 time lords and 2 companions who managed to steal the last ancient TARDIS on Arcadia and follow one of the the Doctor's vortex wake out of the time-lock as Gallifrey is destroyed.
But, I found encounters to be a bit cumbersome. For example, the group managed to create a few small perception filters and tried to sneak past some Daleks. The whole action/reaction bit threw me as a GM. I figured the contested roll to sneak would be the group's sneak roll (action) vs. the Dalek's awareness roll (reaction). Then the Daleks would get a -2 to act on the fighting as their action?
Or should I have assigned a difficult to sneak by the Daleks and if the group failed, then the Daleks would act normally?
Or is either acceptable?
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Post by cigarman on May 11, 2015 23:43:16 GMT
Whatever works best for the plot/story.
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Post by Stormcrow on May 12, 2015 0:51:45 GMT
Don't use action rounds unless you expect to play a series of actions with plenty of complications. Without that, just stick to simple conflicts. The players want to sneak past the Daleks, so roll the Daleks' reaction to find the difficulty of the players roll(s). Either the players succeed or the Daleks spot them. One opposed roll is all that's needed.
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Post by Stormcrow on May 12, 2015 14:32:03 GMT
Here's a fuller answer now that I'm on a PC instead of a phone.
There are three main types of roll in the game: basic rolls against a difficulty set by the gamemaster (let's call them "basic rolls"), Conflicts (also known as Simple Conflicts), and Extended Conflicts.
With basic rolls, the process is generally like this: the player says what they want to do, the GM sets a difficulty, the player rolls, and the GM interprets what happened. Easy.
A Conflict takes place when what a player wants to do is at odds with what a gamemaster character wants to do. The GM does not choose a difficulty. Instead, the GM rolls the GM character's skill to get a difficulty that the player must beat. Notice that in a Conflict, what the GM character does is not a "reaction" as defined for Extended Conflicts (below); what the GM character is doing need not be directly in response to what the player character is doing. For instance, a Cyberman wants to shoot at you, but you want to try to talk him out of it. The Cyberman rolls Coordination+Marksman and gets 11. This is your difficulty. You roll Presence+Convince and get 15: a Good result. The Cyberman doesn't shoot; it agrees to take you in for Cyber-conversion.
A Simple Conflict is over in a single pair of rolls. There are no action rounds, determining who goes first, or reaction rolls. This is best when the conflict is over quickly. Not every conflict needs all that.
But when you DO need all that, use Extended Conflicts. Now you apply the full rules. When someone tries to do something to you, you get a chance to resist that has nothing to do with your chosen action for the round, a "reaction." Reactions are purely defensive. It is here that making a reaction at one point during the round will count as "doing something," giving your next action in the round a -2.
So: only choose the level of complexity that suits the situation. Use basic rolls against static challenges, Conflicts against adversaries in which the outcome is resolved quickly and simply, and Extended Conflicts where the action is broken into a series of structured choices and rolls. With practice, you learn which is best in a given situation.
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Post by doctorrules on May 19, 2015 19:59:48 GMT
Thank you
Given the encounter and the number of people in it, it seemed like the right place for an extended one. But I appreciate the run down.
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Post by doctorrules on May 21, 2015 20:26:23 GMT
Okay, so at the end of the day, I'm still a little confused. Having spent pretty much a lifetime playing RPGs where players roll against defenses, this system of roll comparison is confusing me. If we're in an extended conflict, can someone decided NOT to react? And if so, is there an automatic success or a standard difficult?
For example say a talker wants to convince a fighter not to fight. Maybe the talker fails. When we come to the fighting portion, say the original talker decides "I'll just let the fighter punch me." Great, but then how do you determine damage if there's no contested roll?
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Post by da professor on May 22, 2015 11:46:47 GMT
For example say a talker wants to convince a fighter not to fight. Maybe the talker fails. When we come to the fighting portion, say the original talker decides "I'll just let the fighter punch me." Great, but then how do you determine damage if there's no contested roll? If the person being punched takes no defensive action, his total for defence would be zero, so the attacker automatically hits and his total is compared to zero for damage. That's how I would run it, anyway.
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Post by Stormcrow on May 22, 2015 14:25:37 GMT
If your target doesn't resist you, then it's not a Conflict. Use the basic rules, where the GM chooses a Difficulty for the roll. Or, if the action would obviously succeed, just rule that it succeeds.
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Post by Marnal on May 23, 2015 16:12:15 GMT
A tree won't react when you shoot at it. But you still might miss. So some sort of difficulty is in order. IIRC the basic rules give a diff of 12 for virtually everything. The UNIT combat rules give a diff of 12/14/16 for short/medium/long ranges.
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Post by da professor on May 24, 2015 7:21:31 GMT
A tree won't react when you shoot at it. But you still might miss. So some sort of difficulty is in order. IIRC the basic rules give a diff of 12 for virtually everything. The UNIT combat rules give a diff of 12/14/16 for short/medium/long ranges. Point. I was thinking hand-to-hand. If you want a miss chance when standing right next to an unmoving target, I would recommend something lower than for shooting, like maybe a 6
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