[originally published December 27th, 2024 on the former Keskin Woods blogspot page]



The importance of balance risk with reward cannot be understated. Players don't invest when there are no stakes. Where is the boundary between success and failure? My thoughts on this have evolved. 

The first iteration of success

I started out with the idea that I would ask for a roll and give a check count when we get to a place a roll should go. The check count was the total number of successes the player needed to roll to get a partially favorable roll. More successes than this would be a more favorable roll. There were two issues with this system. 

  1. I could not remember to give the check count before the player rolled
  2. There was no standardized metric against which to set the check count so players didn't know if they did well when they rolled

The end result was inconsistent gameplay and player and storyteller frustration. 

Take 2

Well, my working memory is pretty awful, so what do I do instead? One option is to ask my player to prompt me for the target or to not share with the player ahead of time. I don't like the first as if we both forget, it still feels bad. The second one can work in concept. In practice, given there is no "critical hit" system, my initial play tester didn't enjoy not knowing how well they did. 

Take 3

I was stumped. In conference with one of my weekly game groups' players, Glenn, I am now trying their exceptional idea. At baseline, rolls need 3 successes to get a partial success. That number can increase by 1 for different factors, be it environmental, social, combative, or personal. 

I'll be testing whether to give those reasons before the roll or just give the target number. Current thoughts are to give the reasons before the roll so I can work with my poor working memory instead of fighting it. 


Now to decide what factors to use. And whether to specify or to leave generalized.