Critical success / failure on more than 3 dice

[zot]

Do the new rules handle this?

It occurred to me that you could roll 3 dice first, check for automatics and criticals, and then add in more dice if it's not automatic or critical. This would keep the same probabilities for automatic and critical success / failure.

You could also have 3 white dice, use other colors for extra dice, and roll them all at the same time, using only the white ones for automatic / critical results.

[Rick_Smith]

Originally Posted by zot

Do the new rules handle this? ...

You could also have 3 white dice, use other colors for extra dice, and roll them all at the same time, using only the white ones for automatic / critical results.

Hi Zot, everyone.
I like your 3 colored dice suggestion above, but the old TFT DID cover this situation. On the old GM shield there are critical results for non-standard number of dice, so it can be said that the old TFT handled it. However, those numbers on the GM shield were rarely used information that I always had to look up (even if it meant digging the GM shield out), until I memorized the table.

Your system of 3 dice a single color is MUCH easier to remember.

Warm regards, Rick.

[tbeard1999]

Originally Posted by zot

Do the new rules handle this?

It occurred to me that you could roll 3 dice first, check for automatics and criticals, and then add in more dice if it's not automatic or critical. This would keep the same probabilities for automatic and critical success / failure.

You could also have 3 white dice, use other colors for extra dice, and roll them all at the same time, using only the white ones for automatic / critical results.

An elegant solution to a particularly annoying problem. Thanks.

[zot]

I mentioned using more than one die color in another thread and Skarg said 3 of one color would work fine for the probabilities, so he deserves credit too! Multiple colors is easier than rolling three and then adding more.

Originally Posted by Skarg

Not that I recall, but it's certainly an easy way to get the exact same odds of crit success/failure. Just always have 3 dice the same color, and use those dice only to determine the usual end results on 3 dice, with the other dice only mattering if you haven't rolled a 3-5 or 16-18.

But that's only good IF that is really what you want.

[flankspeed]

Originally Posted by zot

.... You could also have 3 white dice, use other colors for extra dice, and roll them all at the same time, using only the white ones for automatic / critical results.

I love the sheer elegance of this idea! No need to even waste space on a GM screen or in the rule books to delineate critical results for rolls of more than 3 dice. I presume the 3 dice representing the automatic/critical results would override the total of all the dice taken together IF the 3 dice came up with automatic/critical numbers.

I just noticed the same technique could be used with throws of 2 dice for especially easy tasks. Roll 2 dice of one color and 1 die of another color. Use the 3 dice together to determine automatic successes, failures, and crits, but read only the 2 dice of one color for normal results.

Task rolls of only 1 die are already considered automatic successes, but 3 dice could still be rolled together to see if a critical success comes up while ignoring any other result than a critical success.

This multi-colored dice approach seems to be a nice, elegant solution to rolls of any number of dice!

[zot]

Originally Posted by flankspeed

I love the sheer elegance of this idea! No need to even waste space on a GM screen or in the rule books to delineate critical results for rolls of more than 3 dice. I presume the three dice representing the automatic/critical results would override the total of all the dice taken together IF the three came up with automatic/critical numbers.

I just noticed the same technique could be used with throws of 2 dice for especially easy tasks. Roll two dice of one color and one dice of another color. Use the three dice together to determine automatic successes, failures, and crits, but read only the two dice of one color for normal results.

Task rolls of only 1 die are already considered automatic successes, but 3 dice could still be rolled together to see if a critical success comes up while ignoring any automatic or critical failures.

This multi-colored dice approach seems to be a nice, elegant solution to rolls of any number of dice!

Yes, if the three white dice roll an automatic or critical result, you ignore the others (like with the roll-3 and then more method).

Oh, I hadn't thought about rolling fewer dice -- that's a great idea!

[flankspeed]

Originally Posted by zot

Yes, if the three white dice roll an automatic or critical result, you ignore the others (like with the roll-3 and then more method).

Oh, I hadn't thought about rolling fewer dice -- that's a great idea!

Thanks! To stay in line with the idea of reading the 3 dice first, when rolling only 2 dice of one color plus a third die, the total of all 3 would override whatever is rolled on the 2 dice of one color.

A nice side effect of this method is that the original rules only stated a 2 dice roll automatically succeeded on a 2 and failed on a 12. By rolling 3 dice in total, we can still determine critical hits and misses even when rolling what would normally be only a 2 dice roll in the original rules.

[zot]

Originally Posted by flankspeed

Thanks! To stay in line with the idea of reading the 3 dice first, when rolling only 2 dice of one color plus a third die, the total of all 3 would override whatever is rolled on the 2 dice of one color.

A nice side effect of this method is that the original rules only stated a 2 dice roll automatically succeeded on a 2 and failed on a 12. By rolling 3 dice in total, we can still determine critical hits and misses even when rolling what would normally be only a 2 dice roll in the original rules.

Hmm, another possibility would be to just keep with the 3 white dice but add 1 or 2 to use for the 1 or 2 dice roll, only using them for a "normal" result on the 3 dice.

Maybe that horks the probabilities too much though, I don't know. Probably better to stick with your method and keep the 1 or 2 dice as part of the 3.

[flankspeed]

Originally Posted by zot

.... Probably better to stick with your method and keep the 1 or 2 dice as part of the 3.

I found a thread in the House Rules that seems to also be addressing this topic. Perhaps the topic does belong in House Rules, but here is the thread and then a summary I posted over there:

http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=159086

ROLLS BY DICE:

-- 1d: Automatic Success, but roll 3d anyway, use result only if a critical success

-- 2d: Roll 2d of one color plus 1d of another color, read all 3 dice first for automatic success/failure/crit, if no automatic results then read the 2d of one color normally

-- 3d: Roll 3d normally and determine automatic success/failure/crit normally

-- 4d or more: Roll 3d of one color plus as many more differently colored dice as needed, read the 3 dice of one color first for automatic success/failure/crit, if no automatic results then read the total of all dice normally

NOTE: Of course, different sized dice could be used instead of differently colored ones. Also, you don't really need colored or sized dice if you can merely be sure to segregate the dice so on a 2d roll you have two dice you can read separately among the three dice, or on a roll of 4d or more you have three dice you can read separately among the four or more dice.

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by zot

Do the new rules handle this?

It occurred to me that you could roll 3 dice first, check for automatics and criticals, and then add in more dice if it's not automatic or critical. This would keep the same probabilities for automatic and critical success / failure.

You could also have 3 white dice, use other colors for extra dice, and roll them all at the same time, using only the white ones for automatic / critical results.

The original rules handle it.

AM page 18 covers 4d with full detail level for combat rolls.
ITL page 40 covers 1d to 8d for saving rolls - but notes that auto success should not be used for other types of rolls. (automatically failing, however...)
Combining them fully is not done until Dragons of Underearth, and the FMC-81 includes the table, as well...

The auto-success range is formulaic: On n dice where n>1, a=(3×(n-1))-1 or less succeeds. The bad results mirror it, so f=7n-a or more

If making combat rolls...
Special success (2×Damage) and critical success (3×Damage) are part of the range defined by a.
I need to check for the correct ranges.
Pulled the following table from my notes:

 Dice		2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	
Damage ×3	—	3	4-5	5-7	6-9	7-11	8-13	9-15
Damage ×2	—	4	6-7	8-10	8-10	12-16	14-19	16-22
Autohit ×1	2	5	8	11	14	17	20	23
Automiss	12	16	20	24	28	32	36	42
Drop weapon	—	17	21-22	25-27	29-32	33-37	37-42	43-48
Break weapon	—	18	23-24	28-30	33-36	38-42	43-48	49-54