Automatic Success and Failure on a natural 20 and 1

zugschef · Post by **zugschef** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 9:49 pm

Is there any room for this mechanic under any circumstance?

***

name_here wrote:Okay, I'm feeling the shadow of a conversation that won't go anywhere because of a terminology conflict.

When referring to automatic success or failure, do you guys mean "always succeed on a natural 20" or "When your stats are high enough you don't need to roll"?

i'm talking about auto-success on a natural 20 and auto-fail on a natural 1.
i'll copy&paste this in the op.

Whatever · Post by **Whatever** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 9:51 pm

Yes.

edit: No.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 9:53 pm

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 9:58 pm

Dean · Post by **Dean** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 9:59 pm

Ice9 · Post by **Ice9** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 10:04 pm

Yes.

Edit: Oh sure, change the question.
But actually, "under any circumstances?" still yes. Not for skill checks, but for some type of roll that was supposed to be more unpredictable? Sure.

echoVanguard · Post by **echoVanguard** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 10:13 pm

This probably should have been a poll.

Also, yes.

echo

JigokuBosatsu · Post by **JigokuBosatsu** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 10:16 pm

Maybe.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 10:20 pm

zugschef · Post by **zugschef** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 10:35 pm

i like the humor of pubescent teenagers.^^

i personally think it's a bullshit mechanic. if you are so good at a certain thing that you can't fail under a given circumstance, so be it. and i don't care about the consequence. doesn't matter if it's a save, attack, skill check, ability check, whatever.

echoVanguard · Post by **echoVanguard** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 11:08 pm

Not to put too fine a point on it, but some people find black swan events in games exciting. A player getting a lucky triple-20 against an extremely powerful enemy is memorable in a way that "and then we killed the guy and took his stuff" is not. Similarly, if your bonus is sufficiently high that even on a natural 1 you will succeed on a save, you are utterly indifferent to any event in-game involving that save and the event might as well not even have occurred in the game.

Your expressed opinion basically boils down to "I think it's dumb, and if that has consequences, who cares." I applaud you for having a concretely stated position, but I don't think it makes for very compelling design.

echo

hyzmarca · Post by **hyzmarca** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 11:53 pm

Impossible does not mean very difficult. Very difficult is winning the Nobel prize. Impossible is eating the sun.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 11:53 pm

There are better ways to handle "you are not perfect, you might actually manage to fail/you could fluke it and somehow pull through".

If you want that kind of thing, probably because it's a human-level thing where people drive cars and fire guns or the other way round (that is, people seem reasonably "real" and are all vaguely within the same ballpark), then you do a dice pool thing. This way, no matter how good you get, you can still theoretically fail, but each point of goodness makes that less likely - whereas "1d20+50,000,000 against DC 10, you still fail on a 1" means you always have a 5% chance.

For success to always be a possibility, maybe you use exploding dice - a 1-3 is not a hit, a 4-5 is a hit, a 6 is a hit and triggers a bonus die. Alternatively, you make literally everything opposed (you want to smash the vending machine? It rolls Toughness against your Smashing) so tasks can manage to fail to be challenging against you.

On the other hand, superawesome stuff (superheroes, anime ninjas, D&D), you want some things to literally be impossible to do, and other things impossible to fail.

Dean · Post by **Dean** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 11:57 pm

I think the notion of needing to always have failure as an option is foolish. I genuinely like the idea that at 10th level you should just say "I kill all the orcs". When you are off someone's RNG there is really no value in making you roll dice to only look for extremely unlikely situations.

Blasted · Post by **Blasted** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 12:03 am

I think that the possibility of failing something utterly mundane is not conducive for fun. Having a character decapitate himself while tying a shoe is not good, and given characters will attempt many more insta-win scenarios (tying shoe, buying from shop, stabbinating goblin at level 10, etc.) you're more likely to ruin a game through screwing up than have a memorable success.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 12:06 am

Okay, I'm feeling the shadow of a conversation that won't go anywhere because of a terminology conflict.

When referring to automatic success or failure, do you guys mean "always succeed on a natural 20" or "When your stats are high enough you don't need to roll"?

Blasted · Post by **Blasted** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 12:08 am

I'm assuming "no roll is necessary, carry on".

zugschef · Post by **zugschef** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 1:43 am

name_here wrote:Okay, I'm feeling the shadow of a conversation that won't go anywhere because of a terminology conflict.

When referring to automatic success or failure, do you guys mean "always succeed on a natural 20" or "When your stats are high enough you don't need to roll"?

i'm talking about auto-success on a natural 20 and auto-fail on a natural 1.
i'll copy&paste this in the op.

LuciaMariangela · Post by **LuciaMariangela** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 1:48 am

Hmmm, I dunno. I suppose that if the system itself were designed in such a way that it worked it could. But apart from the much more loose systems like DARPG or something I don't know how you'd design such a system. Because in a much more stringent system, with much more stringent rules regarding the element of chance, you naturally have to account for even the extremely unlikely events. This puts pressure on you to merely handwave it away and say that these things have to be rolled anyway just in case or to merely handwave it away and say that you CAN buy certain rolls. However, in a much more fair system, I think that the most accurate representation of the actual world/characters/interactions becomes the goal. And if there really were a way for these characters to know 100% that they would succeed, then yeah, there'd be no need for a roll. But I mean, in reality, who can ever say with 100% certainty that they'll succeed at anything. I mean, that's getting into predicting the future territory (which is inherently impossible). That's why those looser systems can make it work better. But could there be a place for it? Possibly, it'd just take the right system.

*Edit: Oops, I interpreted OP's original question completely differently. In the correct interpretation, my answer becomes a simple yes, because with that kind of autosuccess you're still rolling, chance has already been dealt with. Depending on the damages your system has your characters set up to deal, autosuccess on a 20 (or whatever) can work just fine.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 1:48 am

Oh, then fuck no, and also I think that reverses like everyone's answer.

hyzmarca · Post by **hyzmarca** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 1:55 am

If you always succeed on a Natural 20, then there is a 100% chance that your game world is destroyed, because. Because all it really takes is someone attempting to eat the sun about 20 times on average and there is no limit to the number of times a character can attempt to eat the sun.

zugschef · Post by **zugschef** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 2:02 am

Kaelik wrote:Oh, then fuck no, and also I think that reverses like everyone's answer.

you'd think so and you'd be wrong.^^

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 2:11 am

zugschef wrote:
Kaelik wrote:Oh, then fuck no, and also I think that reverses like everyone's answer.
you'd think so and you'd be wrong.^^

Or you know, literally the first person posting afterword said that changed their answer, and so will probably half the fucking people in the beginning who just answered yes.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 2:13 am

hyzmarca wrote:If you always succeed on a Natural 20, then there is a 100% chance that your game world is destroyed, because. Because all it really takes is someone attempting to eat the sun about 20 times on average and there is no limit to the number of times a character can attempt to eat the sun.

Actually, there's a hard limit on how many times most characters can try, and that limit is zero. You only roll when there's a chance of success and of failure.

zugschef · Post by **zugschef** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 2:14 am

Kaelik wrote:
zugschef wrote:
Kaelik wrote:Oh, then fuck no, and also I think that reverses like everyone's answer.
you'd think so and you'd be wrong.^^
Or you know, literally the first person posting afterword said that changed their answer, and so will probably half the fucking people in the beginning who just answered yes.

LuciaMariangela wrote:*Edit: Oops, I interpreted OP's original question completely differently. In the correct interpretation, my answer becomes a simple yes, because with that kind of autosuccess you're still rolling, chance has already been dealt with. Depending on the damages your system has your characters set up to deal, autosuccess on a 20 (or whatever) can work just fine.