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[Harry Baldman]

The other problem I may have is that there won't really be as much of a sense of progression in regards to your character's abilities. If we focus on failure for a second here, the current system makes it so that characters we get good at something basically stop making huge fuckups. In the new system it seems that no matter how good a character is on paper, he has just as big of a chance as a complete newbie to just completely bungle his attempt at doing whatever it is he's doing.

The current system makes it so that you violently fuck up with the same or greater frequency as you get better at something rather than increases the chances of success, or at least that's the case until they get an extremely pricy upgrade. So the chances don't actually change, I guess.

Although in the new system it should be noted that the chances of success do seem to be tied to your skill as well, but less obviously. For instance, when doing simpler things an Exo bonus of +2 basically makes your 1s into standard 2s, so you don't murder yourself 1/6th of the time anyway. At the same time overshooting becomes less drastic as your skill improves.

[Radio Controlled]

It's gonna be weird in the beginning though, with people who could previously do certain things perfectly suddenly failing at them again. I'm gonna miss being able to build whatever I want for people without fail. But if that's the price we pay for progress, then so be it.

But how to explain it IC? Stasis dementia to the rescue!

[piecewise]

1.The primary problem I see happening is inconsistency.  So, I have a +3 to Exo, and roll a one.  How much does the result rely on PW's mood?

This will always be a problem in an RTD setting. One way I can see to help with keeping consistency is showing all the rolls, but I feel that detracts from the immersion.

Who?  To my knowledge, while Pyro and Radio are above me in rank, and therefore capable of superseding anything I say, I'm the guy in charge of sods. 
And I don't think either Pyro or Radio would mind fifty sods being used to test the PM.

I wouldn't mind indeed if it's not excessive. But as I said, if Hep people ever want the machine back, they get it at the end of the current mission cycle. And you guys have a laser instaporter incoming to try and duplicate, the backlog of what you still have, and normal work like building and researching. Meanwhile people on ship are wasting valuable turns blowing spitbubbles while they could be hilariously harming themselves for science.


PW: to what extent would we be allowed to respec our characters?

Secondly, when would you switch?

I would probably do it like this:

Everyone would be able to respec however they like, though they'd have to do it themselves on the wiki
Everyone would get a refund for decomps. Full refund.
We'd do it in the transition between missions, so we'd go into a mission fresh with the new system.

And for the record, no, there would be no more 1/3 rd bonuses. Instead we might have to adjust how many points you need to get a +1. Or, I suppose we shouldn't call them pluses anymore. More like levels, since thats more what they're like.

I'm not entirely convinced about the new system, but mostly for selfish reasons. The entire idea behind Pan right now is that he throws 5's 2/3 of the time. More importantly, he cannot throw 1's or anything higher than 5 anymore, which is a huge reassurance for me because I can be fairly sure that the little thing in his brain won't just kill him outright. Though I suppose if skill points start affecting overshoots this point might be moot.

The other problem I may have is that there won't really be as much of a sense of progression in regards to your character's abilities. If we focus on failure for a second here, the current system makes it so that characters we get good at something basically stop making huge fuckups. In the new system it seems that no matter how good a character is on paper, he has just as big of a chance as a complete newbie to just completely bungle his attempt at doing whatever it is he's doing.

What I'm trying to say is: I sort of min-maxed Pan to be decent at amps and now that may cease to be, which concerns me somewhat as everything I've done with him goes towards this one build. I can certainly see a lot of good aspects of the new system though, don't think that I'm radically against it or something.

Hence why I said high end characters wouldn't like it. I will say however that I think you will see a progression and your increased skills will keep you safer. A guy with Level 2 in Exo rolling a 3 is probably gonna be better then a guy with 0 rolling a 4 or the like. Higher levels, like I said, would insulate you from the effects of failure while still letting them happen. Because, as people pointed out, just getting auto-successes on everything makes it rather boring. Even jim should mess up occasionally; just not as badly as other people.

[piecewise]

One thing I can do, if you guys would like, Is whenever I roll, I'll also include a short description of how the roll would have gone if we used the new system. I honestly don't roll character actions much  so it's not too big a deal.

[Radio Controlled]

One thing I can do, if you guys would like, Is whenever I roll, I'll also include a short description of how the roll would have gone if we used the new system. I honestly don't roll character actions much  so it's not too big a deal.

If it isn't too much trouble, then yes, that might give us a feel for how the new system would work. But only if it isn't too much a hassle!

[Tavik Toth]

Oh dear. Is it me or does the description of those objects remind anyone of the ghost ship mission? Or maybe I'm just panicking a little bit right now.

[Wolfkit]

For a minute I thought that it was sad that the only roll I'm going to have made with the current situation was an endurance roll for being rocket piledrived into a steel wall. Then I remember this is ER, I'm going to get more endurance rolls before this event is over.

[Unholy_Pariah]

You guys think its possible to steal a wireframe dog without becoming trapped forever?

[Nikitian]

One thing I can do, if you guys would like, Is whenever I roll, I'll also include a short description of how the roll would have gone if we used the new system. I honestly don't roll character actions much  so it's not too big a deal.

Yes please, if possible; maybe even have a whole mission's worth of playtesting - if we do come over to a new system (which even I might be beginning to appreciate), we'd rather have playtested it a lot.

A question: what would happen to Maurice's/Mesk's 'medical expertise' perk?

[PyroDesu]

Welp, looks like the VR rigs on the Sword are leaking.

[syvarris]

@Kriellya, talking about dynamic bonuses.

I disagree with you about dynamic bonuses being a poor idea.  They make logical sense, especially for newbies, because you're spending the time mentally preparing yourself.  It's much easier to do something if you take it slow and think about it, rather than rushing through the procedure.

They make game sense too- sure, you can use a dynamic bonus to remove the 33% chance of big mistakes.  Or, you could try twice, risking those mistakes, but potentially getting twice as much done too.  This applies even more to higher level people, who wouldn't risk much even on a one.

I do think that trying easier things should reduce the chance of outright failure.  Jim, for example, shouldn't have a small chance of failing to heat a cup of tea by ten degrees, even if he doesn't prepare.  He should just succeed.  Now, if he tries to catch a passing airplane and ram it into the ground, THAT should have a significant chance of failure.  Or burning a massive hole straight through a blast door.  With the current system, he wouldn't be able to fail, except possibly from running out of mind points.


Also, Pyro's star wasn't caused by an overshoot.  PW didn't even roll.  Pyro's star was entirely caused by Pyro thinking that heating several million cubic meters wasn't a terrible idea.  To be fair, it was the first -9 event, so he couldn't have known quite how badly that would go.

[Nikitian]

@syvarris
Except mentally preparing yourself for something can get you only so far, realistically speaking (and this edition, we're striving for more realism, hehe!). They say nothing you have read or heard or seen can prepare you for war. Hell, even 'mentally preparing' for a math test can only do so much for your mark! You either know how to do it or not. Sure, there's anxiety and all other stuff, but it can be described as Will rolls and others, and it still comes to the point that you can't just magickally 'prepare yourself' for it mentally.
Now, following the same analogy, making cheat sheets beforehand is another matter entirely. That is why I believe in preparation (though I'm uncertain how it should be implemented - perhaps by straight bonuses to skill levels with the new 'roll to get described' system), but only concrete and world-based (requiring time, equipment and creativity/effort) as opposed to game mechanics-based (using up mere turns and actions).

[Radio Controlled]

It does make sense in some cases, yet less in others.

For example, if I throw a tennis ball at you, then the odds of you successfully catching it are much better if I warn you beforehand and you can prepare for it, as opposed to the ball coming at your face at high velocities out of the blue.

One could argue for a case-by-case basis, but that's too inconsistent and open to abuse.

[Parisbre56]

Looks like I'm going to have to rewrite my templates...

Not much time to discuss. Currently ambivalent. I'd like to see a more definite description of the New system.

@Piecewise: If there's something else you'd like to change in the ER system, you could use this as an opportunity to do so. You could even rebuild the entire thing from scratch. Not saying that you should, just saying that this gives you the opportunity to change many things that need changing.

[Nikitian]

Advanced Disasters and Delinquents: 2nd Edition!