Feint combat maneuver with margin of success of zero (foe fails)

[gamaleo]

I searched the forum and googled for this, but didn't seem to find an answer to this question. So here it goes...

My question is about the Feint maneuver scenario where the foe fails their quick contest roll but you succeed on your quick contest roll with a margin of success of zero.

Page 365 of the Basic Set says this about the outcome of the quick contest during a feint:

"If you make your roll, and your foe fails, subtract your margin of success from the foe's active defense if you attack him with Attack, All-Out Attack, or Move and Attack on your next turn."

The example I find problematic is: If your skill is 15 and you roll a 15 (a margin of success of zero), your foe defends against you at -0 next turn (i.e., you succeed but get nothing for your success).

It seems like the rule should be revised to read "subtract the sum of 1 and your margin of success from your foe's active defense..." and, for balance, that same change should probably be made to the case where "you and your foe both succeed but you succeed by more".

Or maybe the easier fix would be to revise the rule to say that the minimum you subtract for a successful feint is 1 (to cover the case of a zero margin of success, but that still seems like your are getting cheated in the case of higher margins of success).

Am I missing something here, or was this considered such a minor edge case that it wasn't worth addressing?

I also looked at the Third Edition Basic Set Revised rules for the Feint maneuver on page 96, and the problem is there too. I find it hard to believe that I am the first person to ask about this, but I had to ask.

[Varyon]

Generally speaking, in cases where a Success with MoS 0 would have no impact (Lifting is another example, as it gives +5% to BL per MoS), my inclination is to treat MoS 0 as MoS 0.5 if a fraction makes sense, as MoS 1 otherwise. As -0.5 to defense isn't really a thing in GURPS*, treat MoS 0 on a Feint as MoS 1, for -1 to defense (while for Lifting, you'd have MoS 0 give +2.5% to BL).

*If you don't mind a bit of added complexity, you could indeed have -0.5 come into play by having it be retroactively in effect prior to any rounding. This would mean anyone who is using a Block or Parry off an even effective skill level or is using Dodge and has Basic Speed that is an integer value or an integer +0.25 would suffer an effective -1, while anyone who is using a Block or Parry off an odd effective skill level or is using Dodge and has Basic Speed that is an integer +0.5 or +0.75 would be able to defend at their full defense. For example, a character with skill 12 and Basic Speed 6 simply has Parry 9 and Dodge 9; -0.5 reduces these to 8.5 each, which round down to 8, so a net -1. But someone with skill 13 and Basic Speed 6.5 actually has Parry 9.5 and Dodge 9.5. Normally that gets rounded down to 9 each - but when suffering a -0.5 to defense, they simply get reduced to 9 each before rounding comes into play.

[fritzbc]

What Varyon is your best bet. If it isn't present RAW, just rule it as whatever you'd like. Although if you want the most realistic option, see Varyon's. Personally, Varyon's more complicated option is what I think works better.

[Rolando]

I would recommend not bothering with complicated calculations, specially during combat.

A success by 0 is 0 penalty, it is a one second action, it is a turn...you need at least MoS 1 to make feint something relevant.

Or call it MoS 0 = -1 defense if the characters are low points and you want to help them to encourage the use of different combat options instead of just bashing the enemies with regular, unmodified, attacks.

The game will play much better if you don't stop it to check if the NPC have a 9.5 or 9 dodge or anything like that.

Keep things moving and interesting.

[fritzbc]

True, I was coming from the Play by Post perspective.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Rolando

I would recommend not bothering with complicated calculations, specially during combat.

That's probably the best route to take, yeah, I was just saying if a group is inclined to tack on complexity, this would be an option. Currently, from an optimization standpoint, melee combat skills are best to have even values (as this is where you get a +1 to Block/Parry), while Basic Speed is best to have an integer value (as something like Speed 6.5 costs [10] more than Speed 6, yet the only thing it generally gets out of that is sometimes getting to act a little earlier in the turn sequence); giving benefits to odd skill levels and non-integer Speed can somewhat encourage their use (although "the foe has MoS 0 on a Feint and you fail your roll" is quite the edge case).

[tbone]

Originally Posted by Rolando

Or call it MoS 0 = -1 defense if the characters are low points and you want to help them to encourage the use of different combat options instead of just bashing the enemies with regular, unmodified, attacks.

I go with this. There are a lot of examples of rules saying "treat success by 0 as success by 1"; doing so for feints, too, is a quick and easy fix.

(The text on BS p. 365 really should explicitly state this, though. Or whatever the official rule is!)

[gamaleo]

Originally Posted by tbone

I go with this. There are a lot of examples of rules saying "treat success by 0 as success by 1"; doing so for feints, too, is a quick and easy fix.

Yeah, I agree. That is my plan. Honestly, if I noticed this during a game session, I would make the ruling that you get at least a 1 point penalty to the foe's active defense even if the margin of success is zero (i.e., player characters should always get something for success, although I wouldn't feel bad about cheating the NPCs/monsters in this case, ha).

[kirbwarrior]

Minimum 1 is a really simple solution. The rule I've used for a lot of MoS things is that if the foe fails by more than you succeed by, you (can) use their MoF. This usually doesn't come up much with competent NPCs but can still matter.

[Plane]

I always thought it'd be more interesting to use Margin of Victory instead, that way you can have a margin based purely on their failure, and narrow-ly missed feint defenses would be lesser penalties than big losses.