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05-07-2017, 09:10 PM | #1 | |
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Phoenix, AZ
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Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winner
So weird conundrum.
Basic set and lite say: Quote:
Sean has Strategy-20 Anna has Strategy-15 Sean Rolls a 17; Anna rolls a 15. Anna succeeded because "The winner is ***obvious.*** (Is it?)" But her Margin of Victory is... -3? Where does that fit on the Mass Combat's Combat Results table (p.47)? Do Quick Contests have a minimum Margin of Victory? Should a margin of victory be floored at 1? Also, can I get a generalized ruling for all Quick Contests?
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05-07-2017, 09:29 PM | #2 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Platform Zero, Sydney, Australia
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
From memory, if you're failing a roll by rolling a 17 or 18 and your skill is higher than that, your margin of failure is treated as 1.
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05-08-2017, 12:38 AM | #4 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Platform Zero, Sydney, Australia
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
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05-08-2017, 08:30 AM | #5 |
Join Date: Mar 2013
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
Here's a PK post that addresses how to handle margin of failure if effective skill is 17 or greater. You treat a roll of 17 as failure by 1.
How you should treat a roll of 18 is left unspecified. |
05-08-2017, 10:56 AM | #6 | |
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Phoenix, AZ
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
Quote:
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05-08-2017, 11:21 AM | #7 |
Join Date: Jun 2013
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
I'm personally inclined to treat Critical Failures as having a minimum Margin of Failure of 5. That is, you use 5 or actual MoF, whichever is worse.
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05-08-2017, 12:14 PM | #8 | |
Doctor of GURPS Ballistics
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Lakeville, MN
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
Quote:
Sean: Skill-20, Roll-17, margin of success 3 Anna: Skill-15, Roll-15, margin of success 0 Sean should win here, "obviously?" Ah. I see. Roll 17 is notionally auto-fail. Gotcha. [Another Edit]: And yet, from p. B222: "unless another person with this skill leads them. In that case, the GM rolls a Quick Contest of Strategy." This suggests two things to me (not having read PK's post): 1) If the bad guys' IQ is 8 or lower, don't roll. You roll strategy and if you succeed, you know stuff about their plans, fail and you get false info. The bad guys don't get a roll; they just do whatever they're going to do making plans without a good guess as to the "good guys'" intentions. 2) If the bad guys' IQ is 9+ or if they specifically have Strategy, then it's a Quick Contest for which the auto-fail rule doesn't apply. So in the example, Sean makes his roll by 3, Anna by 0, Sean wins. As it is written, so it shall be, etc.
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My blog:Gaming Ballistic, LLC My Store: Gaming Ballistic on Shopify My Patreon: Gaming Ballistic on Patreon Last edited by DouglasCole; 05-08-2017 at 12:23 PM. |
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05-08-2017, 10:32 PM | #9 |
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Phoenix, AZ
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
In Mass Combat, the strategy roll is the main mechanic.
That said, really I want an answer that can be generalized to all cases. And I think the most generalizable answer is assuming that if someone succeeds/fails with a negative/less than 1 margin, they are floored at 0/1 respectively. Altogether though, the important elements of a quick contest are:
Then there is the line that bothers me like crazy about the winner being "obvious," in such a case.
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Blog Running Games on Tuesday (online). Playing Sunday. Last edited by Pseudonym; 05-08-2017 at 10:47 PM. |
05-09-2017, 07:41 AM | #10 |
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Albuquerque, NM
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Re: Mass Combat: Failing Strategy Roll with a bigger Margin of Success than the Winne
For all intents and purposes, you're rolling against a 16 if your skill is higher than 16, so it makes sense that a 17 is a failure by 1. As for critical failures, I usually treat them as failure by infinity; the only oddity that produces is the question of which infinity is bigger if both sides critically fail, but at that point I usually go with something amusingly disastrous for both sides.
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Tags |
mass combat, quick contests |
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