Convoluted +Check system

Something I noticed that seems to need fixing or atleast tweaking. Our check system is great, but lately i've noticed different +check rules being enforced by various PCs in various scenes. Stealth, athletics, whatever - And it's never the same, and some PC always has something to say like "Well <X> storyteller ruled this yesterday so this is the way it should go forever".

We need something more concrete than player characters randomly making up rules and then asking that everyone follows them, or citing an obscure storyteller ruling that no one else in the scene was part of.

Unless you hear a ST tell you for THAT SCENE what the roll should be, there is no roll you -have- to make.

PCs don't even have to follow the Storytelling Template rolls.

The STs are trying to be as consistent as possible. But we are also taking VERY SPECIFIC actions into account. You tried to jump an imposing fence? We decided it was 20 feet high and that's a LEGENDARY JUMP. Eventually, with enough athletics, your character WILL be able to make that jump! And with an amazingly lucky roll, you could make it now!

But that doesn't mean that ALL wall-jumps are that check, either. Nor does a STer letting a character roll easier on the same height mean anything. What if you were on a low-gravity planet?

I know that it can be problematic. But PCs should work things out for themselves. AND they should very rarely use "STer-X had us check at Y difficulty" it should be more "I think the check should be "Challenging because there are people shooting at you and the grate is all rusted over!"

However, if you're trying a feat of strength and someone is like "What stat do we use for lifting or pulling?" it's perfectly acceptable to say "The STs usually have us check athletics."

Thanks, this clears it up a little bit.

But if that is the case, we need a serious change in mentality. The current attitude on the game is that anything, no matter how ridiculous it may be or how uncomfortable it may make others in the scene, can be handled with a check of a skill at difficulty. Hiding in plain sight and telling others they cannot shoot you. Making them check at higher difficulties and citing storyteller rulings, like i said, someone trying to see a hidden person has to hit a higher difficulty than the hider did, rather than doing the same difficulty but getting a higher roll.

Saying they are ripping the blaster out of your hand by checking brawling at average. Etc etc etc.

Are we supposed to use this as a tool for the rare times where its needed, or are we supposed to litter every turn with checks and crazy applications for them? There is an immense amount of pressure to take part in these when players bring them up in scenes. Can you just say "No, im not doing that"?

The check system is ideal for PCs vs NPCs and Environments.

Want to leap up and grab the balcony edge and pull yourself up? Hey, we can +check that.

But PvP play isn't REALLY designed for using +checks.

I know that it gives us the ability to do all sorts of cool stuff. But the combat system exists for the purpose of combat. It does not include grappling, etc.

That doesn't mean you can't +check to have cool things happen... but if people are arguing over it, maybe you should all scale back what you want to do.

I don't mind using the +check system against pcs. I just assume all +checks are average vs average, unless everyone agrees otherwise. Whoever gets the higher percentile on their check wins.

Seems reasonably easy to me, and it's worked so far.

This is why I try to avoid checks in non-ST scenes if at all possible. I never ask for checks from others unless it's absolutely necessary.

The system allows far too much slack and generates far too much controversy as is.

You attack my level 10 character with your level 60?

Too bad, yesterday <X> storyteller let me check streetwise at challenging to have a gang show up to protect me.

You rush to your ship after a long and drawn out battle hoping to escape?

Too bad, I get to check blaster to shoot out your engines, you are screwed.

You spend all day tracking a PC around the grid?

Too bad, they just get to check stealth=average and you never get to find them.


I hope I have some kind of a point here. This puts way too much power into the hands of a generally immature, play to win base.

This is why a detailed system of guidelines ought to be made. Consistency is key. Each skill should have a description of what it represents, and a list of examples which strives to be as complete as possible to do with it, and some sample difficulties of various levels. Jumping, for instance--it's not too hard to say "vaulting over 20 feet is legendary, jumping over 1 foot is laughable" and then extrapolate other heights from there.

I stress that these files should attempt to cover as many scenarios as possible. There should seldom, if ever, be any disagreement over what skill ought to be used in a given situation, and difficulty should be very easy to adjudicate. This tends to work best with an ST present, of course, and would probably still run into problems with PvP.

I don't think that will go away--as I must have said innumerable times on here, when you rely on players to adjudicate for themselves, arguments and disagreements crop up. If you have some guidelines, that will help. If you have a command for opposed checks, that will make it even easier. But the real way to make PvP go relatively smoothly is to use a coded system. Code does not have to be summoned by page, and can be everywhere all at once. It is not going to play favorites.

Is someone's immunity to being spotted simply by rolling a successful stealth +check bothering you? Easy: use a coded system. Sure, it was occasionally maligned, but it was never once confusing. (I can think of several minor tweaks/improvements that could be made to the old system, in addition to the full discussion I have given it elsewhere on these forums.)

A coded solution isn't the solution to every problem, but for certain things that are likely to come up all the time, it will save a lot of conflict. The guides can then make a beautiful supplement that will, hopefully, handle anything else.

I do not need code so much as I need consistent rules on how to accomplish various tasks. I honestly like not having +hide or +snipe since it causes players to interact with each other more. It's just that currently the interaction is mostly consisting of ooc arguments.

Coded solution or well documented rules for +Checks, either one is fine with me.

Or lock +check totally to storytellers and wizards so they perform the neccesary checks instead of us and it broadcasts to the room.

This sucks as is.

Documentation would be a serious task. Many tabletop RPGs put out 500 page books to cover stuff like this.

Nah, the Skills section of your typical tabletop game isn't too bad - it generally lists various scenarios and their difficulty, a feat that's not particularly hard to reproduce.

If we were playing a tabletop game, that is. However, we're playing a competitive - not cooperative - multiuser game. While it is handy to have a way for players to roll +checks for themselves, if it's being abused in such a manner, it should be left for GMed scenes.

I imagine that coming up with documentation on the skills would not be too bad. If this is something that staff is interested in, they could simply make a post per skill and then the players can come up with example actions related to that skill that they would like to know the difficulty of. Staff could assign a difficulty to each example, and then the best examples out of that thread would form up the documentation.

The "hard" way to do it would be for one single person to try to come up with all the examples and difficulties themselves. Doing it in a cooperative player-staff manner makes it simple and even enjoyable task. From experience staffing on past games, I can say that rules development almost always benefit from having a large pool of people consider the issue compared to just a few.

Royal Jelly wrote:

Nah, the Skills section of your typical tabletop game isn't too bad - it generally lists various scenarios and their difficulty, a feat that's not particularly hard to reproduce.

If we were playing a tabletop game, that is. However, we're playing a competitive - not cooperative - multiuser game. While it is handy to have a way for players to roll +checks for themselves, if it's being abused in such a manner, it should be left for GMed scenes.

Tabletop can be described as competitive. I'm not just arguing semantics here: the rules that apply to players generally apply to everyone equally, especially when it comes to skill resolutions. An opposed skill check works just as well if a PC is pitting his will against another PC or against an NPC.

However, I do agree: it is folly to assume that players will be able to work it out among themselves. Scenes just fall apart without an impartial arbiter. Even with one it can turn fairly ugly. Since there are a disturbingly small number of staffers about, and relying on staffers to run scenes basically means players can't be truly spontaneous, we need one of two things, if not both.

One, we need, desperately, extensive guidelines, tabletop-style. This will not quell all arguments, but it will help some of them, since the rules can take the place of an impartial arbiter at great need.

Two, we need some coded mechanisms to handle the more common PvP checks. This need not always be an in-depth coded system, though in the cases I am thinking of (stealth, chases) I think it needs them dearly. But even something very simple would be a marvel:

-A button for opposed checks would be beautiful, since the existing system is clunky at best. If you want to get truly fancy, you can have a few different forms of it, depending on what the situation calls for.
-A mechanism by which chases are automatically resolved, either all at once, or in stages. This wouldn't really be a coded chase, but say you initiated a chase. You could type a command, and it would ask for who is pursuing and who is pursued, and you could then type +chase and it would say "Rosencrantz gains on Guildenstern!" or "Guildenstern increases his lead on Rosencrantz!" or "the pursuit remains hot," or something. Then you make a round of poses, move to the next room, type +chase again. It could even detect if you had opened fire in that round and adjust your difficulty accordingly. Then at the end it declares that the chase is over. Alternatively, a command which just automatically tells you who wins a chase could be nice from time to time.
-And so on.

I spent 25 minutes in a scene yesterday without seeing a single pose. Just watching two sides squabble over stealth and who sees who and how to roll. I finally just walked away.

Get rid of check. I dont know how it turned into "Use +Check constantly for every ridiculous little thing" from "We now have a command to use in storyteller scenes"

This seriously screws up just about every scene that happens. Where is staff to weigh in on this?

Well, DH2 was intended to have storytellers all over the place. This is why a lot of the old coded systems went away. Storytellers were supposed to replace them. The removal of coded hotwiring, stealth, bombing, sniping--storytellers could take care of it! It would surely solve all the old problems!

But I think the expectation was that there would be more than five storytellers--there are simply not enough of them to really do what was envisioned. Every scene that a storyteller runs turns into a huge scene (especially due to +map--doesn't matter how stealthy the scene is, people see a gathering and go join it, and suddenly you have people scanning and looking for you, despite only knowing you're there OOC). It's simply not operating as it was intended. It's basically like having +events all the time with no real planning. I never really liked +events.

So, the problem as I see it is that if you make +check storyteller-only, players will completely lose the ability to do anything without a storyteller present, which will put them in an even worse situation than that of DH1, where at least a few of the things they might have wanted to do were possible using code. If you leave it at is it will continue to be a nightmarish thing every time people get together to +check.

Guidelines will alleviate some of the problems, but not all of them. There is nothing like a coded system to serve as an impartial arbiter, because it can be everywhere and you can't argue with it. Above all else, +checks disrupt things. People will argue with them, storyteller or no.

I personally really like the +check system. Iunno, maybe I'm sick and twisted because I find failure as a character good for developing the character.

As far as I can tell the +check system has been consistant. I do think sometimes (and this will be the only gripe) that the ST's do forget that we're very low level characters and that PCs are the 'heroes' of the game. But then again, when you achieve those great moments in success it is all the more rewarding.

But people succeed, people fail. Seems to make sense to me. Some of the rules regarding individual situations could be clarified, but every ST has a different point of view on things atm too. I think this ties into the atmosphere thread. Maybe people could enjoy the scene and the story, try to accomplish what they want in it and if they fail, look for a plan B.

But again, I like the +check system and it is above all fair. Which in a game is really what matters, everyone gets an equal system to either succeed or fail.

It's not the system or the failure that is problematic. It's that this system is just too much for a good 25 percent of the MU to responsibly handle.

Then the system is not at fault.

The 25% who can't handle it responsibly are. Explain it to them, if they can't grasp it, explain it again. If they still can't grasp maybe they're not the sort of players who can handle a game that requires more thought and story process than your general hack and slash. Nothing wrong with that type of player, but they need to adjust to a system that works fine

The system doesn't need to adjust to players who refuse to understand or change their position regarding what the game is supposed to be.

You cannot debate with these players without inflaming the situation. Is staff willing to slap these people down and correct them? I have not seen it happen yet. Maybe it's happening behind the scenes. I can name 3 to 4 players who are on every day who constantly stop scenes with whining and complaining and their behavior has not improved.

We've had these people on the game for a long time. They are not going to go away. They are, in fact, drawn by many of the game's features, and unless you are going to start banning people from playing because they argue about the game's rules, they aren't going away. This quarter is also disproportionately represented among the people who participate a lot in combat and such things--the combat-avoiding types tend to not be the types who can't handle it, though some of them are. If this quarter, disproportionately represented in combat and conflicts, is going to cause problems with the system, then the system needs to either go or change drastically.

Both statements are right, you can't 'get rid' of those players but you can discourage them. ST can shut off OOC command which is very nice when it happens. There is nothing worst in fact than being in a scene and watching players argue with the ST about the rules. That is just horrendous.

My own thought is ST's should be encouraged to take control of those situations and just ask parties who refuse to abide by the rules of general social courtesy and gameplay to leave the scene until they can do what they're supposed to.

It comes back to what I said a very very very long time ago during development:

Rules only mean as much as the enforcement of them. Right now if people are battling with ST's over rules, bickering, creating a negative unfun environment it can be fixed.

Players who are problems need the expectations of the game explained to them. When they should question a rule, when they shouldn't. When is a good time to hold up a scene, when is it not.

If they break those expectations, have them corrected and reminded of the expectation. If they continue to break it, then remove them from the scene. If it's a continual problem, they obviously cannot function in part of the game society that is being created. I'm not a big fan of being a hardjerk, but if people don't follow rules after they are explained taht is a choice being made to intentionally ruin the game environment which shouldn't be tolerated.

Well, there is a huge problem with your argument:

+check works when there are no STs present. That's really when it's at its worst. A scene which was already nightmarish with an ST present can become utterly monstrous without.

There's also the fact that people chafe under what appears to be a totalitarian staff, which makes judgement arbitrarily and brooks no argument.

As annoying as it is for someone to argue with staff, sometimes staff make mistakes. Sometimes they choose a skill which is inappropriate, or they might miss something you posed, or interpret it wrong. In situations where a player feels this has happened, I feel that it is entirely within their rights to attempt to correct the storyteller. If anything I would say that STs are too often inclined to reject arguments on the basis that what they say goes, and that arguing is disruptive.

If you ban all arguing you stifle player freedom. If you ban it arbitrarily, you open floodgates of complaints about favoritism. What you need is a way to prevent arguing from happening, or at least remove their immediacy.

Or, put another way: with coded stealth, arguing happened all the time, but it was mostly people who didn't want to be spied on complaining that they had to deal with spies as a policy issue. They never interrupted their scene to argue that spies weren't allowed. The scenes continued without pause.

With +checked stealth, arguing happens all the time, except now it's people arguing that they know you're there, or that you can't do this while remaining stealthy, who sees whom, you can't be here because that implies you know that the hidden character is there, and so on. Scenes fall apart, are interrupted, and tend to peter out.

Say what you will about the coded system, I never once saw it ruin a scene due to arguing.

Paradox wrote:

Players who are problems need the expectations of the game explained to them. When they should question a rule, when they shouldn't. When is a good time to hold up a scene, when is it not.

I wrote this specifically to address that. Players should question staff when it is appropriate. Not by arguing with them and stopping a scene, not by cussing them out, not by interrupting a ST making a decision to cut them down and make snide comments. All I have seen (except the cussing out) and it deterred the scenes. Do STs make mistakes? Sure. Is there an appropriate way to deal with it? Yes. Do most people know that appropriate way or follow it? No.

Are coded systems the solution? Depends on your point of view. I think the rules regarding sniping are a bit cumbersome. But here's the other thing I've noticed, most snipering is taking place in 10 person scenes. Everything in those scenes is cumbersome. I have also seen some absolutely amazing RP come out of the current system that is cumbersome because players were willing to work within its confines to tell a story that was more than KEKEKE I WINZ!

Not all players reflect the KEKEKE system, but the rules for Stealth and sniping are laid out, very definitively at the moment. People are still learning them and with time it may work out. But in the end, it falls a lot on the players in other regards to start really accepting the system and moving past what 'was' DH1.

I notice you don't actually suggest an appropriate way to deal with it. What is it? A private page? That will disrupt the scene with sudden absences, and nobody will know what's going on. At the end of the scene? Then your problem won't actually be resolved and you're just complaining.

So who gets to decide if it's appropriate? Staff? The other players in the scene? Nobody? One person's snide remark is another's 'uh, hey, I think you're doing that wrong.' Again: if it is arbitrary you will open the door to significant (and, as far as I'm concerned, legit) complaints of favoritism.

Honestly, the sniper rules as they stand are pretty abysmal. They don't cover basic problems (can I move? can I use stealth to sneak out of the room? what if X extraneous circumstance comes up?), and present a few really unpleasant ones (you can only attempt to see the sniper after he shoots! this means if you never shoot, you are hidden forever!) of their own. They also don't prevent a number of problems that come up with relying on people to separate IC and OOC.

Let's say you're on a stealth mission and you are in an area behind enemy lines that is patrolled but sparsely, if at all. An enemy stumbles in on you whilst wandering OOCly, and immediately poses being suspicious and looking around for intruders, despite you having made no sign that he should detect. You really can't do anything about that.

I always felt the best part about DH1 was the fact that most abuses were simply not possible--that they never once relied on the players to be good enough to avoid them, and seldom had to rely on staff to come and punish those who broke the rules. Most of the rules, it was pretty hard to break. You couldn't act on OOC knowledge that you were be spied on ICly, because you didn't have that OOC knowledge. Gulp once expressed that he felt the best way to prevent abuses of a system was to make abuses impossible, codedly. Relying on people to be good chaps is antithetical to what has always made DH great: the freedom to do basically whatever you wanted, and have fun with it.