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Author Topic: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)  (Read 740046 times)

Harry Baldman

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9495 on: September 04, 2016, 11:51:39 am »

Any premise is worth following up on if you find you can pour enthusiasm into it. As long as the sheet's not too involved I'm sure you could scare up a good few players.
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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9496 on: September 04, 2016, 10:03:33 pm »

Damn, it's been a while.

But I guess I picked a good time to come back, if Yoink's planning on running an RTD. I'd totally be in for that, especially if it's some kinda Biker Gang thing.
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Yoink

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9497 on: September 05, 2016, 06:00:44 am »

...I guess I picked a good time to come back, if Yoink's planning on running an RTD.
Aw, you. *blush*


Hmm, I'm not at my home computer right now but I'm still pondering the setting for this RTD.
Elvish biker gang. Would their bikes be grown from the trees themselves? Or are these elves more okay with metalsmithing etc.? I suppose they're outcasts from elvish society at large anyway, so they wouldn't really care about normal elvish traditions. So many details to work out... I might actually have to do some worldbuilding for once. >.>
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Sean Mirrsen

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9498 on: September 05, 2016, 09:02:12 am »

Boredom levels rising.

Idly mulling about a quasi-RTD system based around "hit dice", with differences.

1 or 2 on the die is a "miss".
5 or 6, or more generally the highest two numbers on the die, is a "hit".

A roll with no hits, and less than half the dice being misses, is a plain failure.
A roll with no hits and at least half the dice being misses, is an Epic Failure.
A roll with half or more dice being misses, but at least some hits, is a "faulty success".
A roll with at least some hits and less than half the dice being misses, is a plain success.
A roll half or more dice being hits, as long as it's at least 4 hits, is a Critical Success.
A roll with at least one hit and all dice aside from hits being misses, is an Overshot. Results vary depending on proportion of hits to misses.
A Critical Success roll that's also an Overshot can be referred to as an Overcrit, and have especially crazy results.

The number of dice rolled for a check is the same all the time, I'm thinking 6.
The outcome can be modified in two ways - adding or removing dice, or adding or removing sides on the dice.
There's also thresholds, i.e. a minimum amount of successes for not failing, which can be used to set difficulty.

Using an Excel spreadsheet here, I'm going to try and see what sort of distributions this leads to.
Results are in order of: Epic Fail, Failure, Faulty Success, Success, Critical Success, OverShot, OverCrit.

Spoiler: Sets of 100, 6xd6 (click to show/hide)

Significant prevalence of successes, with a fair amount of faults. Criticals, failures, and overshots all hovering around the same low probability.

Now let's add a die to the pool:

Spoiler: Sets of 100, 7xd6 (click to show/hide)

Significant increase in successes and criticals, while failures, faults, and overshots, all drop significantly. Good all-round bonus.

If a die is subtracted from the pool instead:

Spoiler: Sets of 100, 5xd6 (click to show/hide)

While the proportion of successes does not change much, critical successes sharply decrease, and overshots and failures of both varieties are more probable.

Next let's add a side to the dice:

Spoiler: Sets of 100, 6xd7 (click to show/hide)

Increasing die size seems to reduce the probability of overshots, criticals, and faults. Makes sense. The difference seems to settle more in the failure side, however.

And then let's reduce the die size instead:

Spoiler: Sets of 100, 6xd5 (click to show/hide)

The probability of regular success sharply drops compared to default, but so does the probability of outright failure. Instead, there's faults, overshots, and overcrits all around.

Rolling sets of d4s is hilarious, there's 2/3rds overshots, 1/3rds overcrits, and the occasional critical success or epic fail.

So, some interesting data. What does it all amount to?

The default dice toss is likely to be a simple success, or a faulty success, with low chances of failures or criticals/overshots.

Increasing dice pool size decreases the likelihood of the result going askew, either as a failure or a fault/overshot. Equivalent of having better skill, or less stressful conditions. Larger pools overcome thresholds easier.
A smaller pool increases the chances of things going wrong critically, and has trouble with thresholds.

Increasing the die size makes it harder to land hit or miss on them, so things that depend on particular amount of hits or misses are affected. Critical successes are the first to go, but with bigger increases critical failures drop too, and things settle into either success or failure. I feel like this represents the approach to doing an action - a calm, slow approach will either succeed or fail, whereas a frantic, or hot-blooded rush will mean more likelihood of messing up, but less chance of outright failure if the person is skilled enough. That's also a thing that happens, how these two alterations interact with each other, and how they interact with the threshold.

For instance.
Low-skill character (dice pool 4), rushing (d5) into an easy task (threshold 0):
14% chance critfail, 2% fail, 18% faulty success, 43% success, 3% critical, 20% overshot.

Same character taking their time (d8): 8% critfail, 15% fail, 7% fault, 65% success, 0% critical, 5% overshot.
Same character, taking their time on a difficult task (threshold 2): 16% chance critfail, 70% chance fail, 8% fault, 3% success, 1% critical, 2% overshot.
Same character, rushing (d5) into the difficult task: 13% critfail, 29% fail, 17% fault, 19% success, 1% critical, 20% overshot.

Since they're low on skill, taking their time does not improve their chances on a difficult task as it does on the easy one - but going all-out they might accomplish something, even if still likely to mess up or critically fail.

Now a higher-skill character (pool 8), same things:
Rushing into easy task: 1% critfail, 0% fail, 26% fault, 23% success, 35% critical, 11% overshot, 4% overcrit
Taking time on easy task: 1% critfail, 9% fail, 4% fault, 73% success, 12% critical, 1% overshot
Taking time on difficult task: 1% critfail, 57% fail, 7% fault, 21% success, 14% critical.
Rushing into difficult task: 1% critfail, 6% fail, 35% fault, 17% success, 25% critical, 14% overshot, 2% overcrit

Skilled character will most likely succeed in doing an easy task the long way, and is very likely to spectacularly succeed if rushing into it. And even with a difficult task, taking time significantly reduces the chance of doing something wrong - it's just doing, doing well, or not doing at all. Rushing into a difficult task reduces the chance of failure significantly, but results in a large chance of doing it wrong (or very right).



I dunno, I was just bored at work and decided to torment OpenOffice Calc with a self-calculating random Shadowrun-style rolls spreadsheet. Not sure if this can even go into anything as it is. But feel free to discuss. :3
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Greenstarfanatic

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9499 on: September 05, 2016, 09:54:59 am »

Hmm, I'm not at my home computer right now but I'm still pondering the setting for this RTD.
Elvish biker gang. Would their bikes be grown from the trees themselves? Or are these elves more okay with metalsmithing etc.? I suppose they're outcasts from elvish society at large anyway, so they wouldn't really care about normal elvish traditions. So many details to work out... I might actually have to do some worldbuilding for once. >.>
Option:

Take the less serious route. Make it a Bicycle gang. Teenage elves riding around on wooden bikes terrorizing elf societies with their "Fancy speed machines".
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Harry Baldman

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9500 on: September 05, 2016, 10:00:53 am »

Or have them ride horses, the original motorcycles.

You might say this is too easy, too boring. But I say there's barely anything as inherently funny as a horse.
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Dermonster

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9501 on: September 05, 2016, 10:21:37 am »

snip


*nods sagely.* I recognize some of those words.
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DoctorMcTaalik

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9502 on: September 05, 2016, 11:06:45 am »

Nah man, packs of elvish bikers ride up and down the Gnommish Steppe, following the migration routes of the walking tree-cattle. Their mastery of the motorcycle is unparalleled, and their skill at bikeback archery has earned them a fearsome reputation across the continent. All it would take would be a series of skilled, charismatic leaders to unite the disparate gangs, and they could not only conquer those pesky city-dwarves to the east, but also establish the largest contiguous motorcycle club the world has ever seen.
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heydude6

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9503 on: September 05, 2016, 12:19:46 pm »

This has got to be my favourite suggestion for the setting so far! I initially imagined this as shadowrun, but centred on an elvish biker gang, but for reasons that I still don't understand, it seems that I was the only one who saw it that way. Anyway, you guys just keep doing what your doing and stay crazy.
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Kadzar

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9504 on: September 05, 2016, 01:30:37 pm »

A few images that I think might fit this idea:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)
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Greenstarfanatic

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9505 on: September 05, 2016, 01:47:18 pm »

On another note, since it feels like it's been grossly underrepresented around here, I'm kinda working on putting together a Kingdom of Loathing-based RTD. I'm not planning on following the main story/quest progressing, but the setting will be all there. I'm still kinda debating whether or not to run it very structured, like Syndicate by TCM, or more wild and "Wingin' It" like RTD Princess Celestia by TCM.

If I were to go the more structured route, players would probably see a lot more stats, equipment, and a lot more individuality. I'd probably have to break out the spreadsheet(s) and hate myself for a little bit, but in the end it would see a lot more exploration within the Kingdom of Loathing and a lot more linearity. So a fun time all around. A fun time with rules, but a fun time nonetheless.

If I were to go the more "Wingin It" route, players would realize that stats are kinda silly, items do weird stuff if you can think of weird stuff for them to do, and chunky salsa is on the menu all day every day. I'd probably spend more time writing creatively, and I'd break out MS Paint, and a couple google docs to keep track of possible goofy references and future combats. It'd be more on the route of Mall Fight, a lot of boss fights, in-fighting, but with an actual plot this time, perhaps even a hint of linearity. Sometimes. Plus, in the end the setting wouldn't be confining, but things have a chance to get too chaotic, for both players and the GM.

I'm just wondering, before I actually start it, what kind of people would be into it? Either style, just felt like doing a heads-up/head-count.
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NJW2000

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9506 on: September 05, 2016, 03:43:01 pm »

The latter, because getting involved with playing kol properly is the thing that made me stop playing, and the former reminds me of that. I felt like you couldn't laugh at the jokes and play efficiently. So I'd run away from a stat-heavy kol game, but might play the other.
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lawastooshort

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9507 on: September 06, 2016, 06:40:55 am »

Yoink, Dr McTaalik's idea is quite good. You should also read the Hunter S Thomson book. Anyway, it sounds like a good idea for a game. You could also make them tiny elves, 6 inches tall, herding chickens across the steppe, riding on barely domesticated guinea pigs and harvesting the eggs.

If anyone has seen the children's programme Ben and Holly, this is what I want to base my next game on.
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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9508 on: September 06, 2016, 02:02:36 pm »

The latter, because getting involved with playing kol properly is the thing that made me stop playing, and the former reminds me of that. I felt like you couldn't laugh at the jokes and play efficiently. So I'd run away from a stat-heavy kol game, but might play the other.


Yeah, probably gonna go with that too. Makes it more fun for me, probably more fun for everyone else too.
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NJW2000

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #9509 on: September 06, 2016, 03:09:31 pm »

The other alternative is using your medium humourously like kol, and producing a game that groans under the weight of its own ridiculous stats and rules, for the players to bend and exploit. But I dunno how funny that could be.
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