Giving it Away

[Blue]

How often do you, as a GM, give away information to the players without benefit of an appropriate skill?

"Do you have.... Science: Biology, or maybe KS: Agriculture?"
"No. But I lived on a farm in my origin story."
"Good enough. Here's what you find out..."

Just curious.

[RDU Neil]

How often do you, as a GM, give away information to the players without benefit of an appropriate skill?

"Do you have.... Science: Biology, or maybe KS: Agriculture?"
"No. But I lived on a farm in my origin story."
"Good enough. Here's what you find out..."

Just curious.

Often, but not always. Example... currently my superteam got "LOST IN SPAAAAACCEEEE!!" and no one on the team is a realy scientist type. There was information that could have been gathered if one of them had been... but it was actually cool that the superteam with a lawyer, occultist/intelligence officer, professional soldier, psychologist and construction/demolitions worker were without real science expertise. (To be fair, they are part of UNTIL/UNITE, and can normally call on all kinds of experts... but this was a great example of them being without such resources... and it had an impact... though a subtle and longer running impact.)

[Supreme Serpent]

All the time.

General stuff often falls under "everyman" for me. I doubt I personally have KS: Lucianno Pavarotti, but I could tell you a few things about him and recognize him. If I don't give it away for free, I'll often do a base Int check.

I also give away lots of info/allow freebies without rolls for skills people have. Have PS: Plumber? I'm not going to make you roll to fix the sink in the base bathroom.

[Blue]

All the time.

General stuff often falls under "everyman" for me. I doubt I personally have KS: Lucianno Pavarotti, but I could tell you a few things about him and recognize him. If I don't give it away for free, I'll often do a base Int check.

I also give away lots of info/allow freebies without rolls for skills people have. Have PS: Plumber? I'm not going to make you roll to fix the sink in the base bathroom.
Is that a big concern? Does the hulk come over and use the toilet often? ;)

[Supreme Serpent]

Is that a big concern? Does the hulk come over and use the toilet often? ;)

I note you picked that example. Does Pavarotti play a major role in your games? ;)

[OddHat]

I'm with SS on this. If it's something that an ordinary person in that setting should be able to remember with a few seconds of thought, I'll either just tell the player or give the character an INT roll and let him go to it. KS:Supervillains will get you some details, but almost every adult in Millennium City has heard of Doctor Destroyer.

On a similar note, if the characters face a giant fire-breathing winged lizard, I will give the guy with KS: Dragons more detailed info than the guy with KS: Arcane Lore, but both will know what they're up against. Even the guy with no KS at all will know that it looks like some kind of Dragon.

[Vanguard00]

Sometimes I "give away" the information because the story calls for it, but most of the time I can find in-story reasons to get the info to the players. There are indeed times when it's frustrating to not have a PC with the appropriate skill, but I can often work around it in some way. An NPC, a newspaper headline, a TV news soundbite, etc. There are myriad ways to get across the information necessary for the advancement of the story. It might simply be a matter of providing a hint for the PC to follow up, rather than the information itself. If nothing else remember that Google is pretty much an "KS: Everything 8-" skill, and can actually be worth more.

[Fox1]

I'll be the odd-ball out and say 'Never'. That likely should be almost never, I'm sure there's slips.

That doesn't mean that I consider all information to need a skill roll. Nor does that mean that the players don't have access to NPCs who have skills they do not.

[Dust Raven]

I'm with SS on this. If it's something that an ordinary person in that setting should be able to remember with a few seconds of thought, I'll either just tell the player or give the character an INT roll and let him go to it. KS:Supervillains will get you some details, but almost every adult in Millennium City has heard of Doctor Destroyer.

On a similar note, if the characters face a giant fire-breathing winged lizard, I will give the guy with KS: Dragons more detailed info than the guy with KS: Arcane Lore, but both will know what they're up against. Even the guy with no KS at all will know that it looks like some kind of Dragon.

This is about how I do it. Something are obvious and need no skill roll.

However, I answered the Poll from the point of view of knowledge that would require a Skill Roll to know. I voted sometimes, because there are several different ways to hand over information. If no one in the group has an appropriate skill, or the guy with the appropriate skill flubs his roll, and I think the information is important but didn't want to just hand it to them free of charge, I've still gotta come up with some method of getting that info to them. I could just tell them anyway (oh, you failed by 4, well then you "only" know this...). I could have Henry the Expert show up ("well, what have you got there chaps? I haven't seen one of these in years!"). I could even post something on the evening news (This just in...). Or if I've made a DNPC roll for the session I can have a nosy DNPC know the answer and suddenly blurt it out (and then follow the heroes when they don't stop to listen to the rest of it because they must know).

[Derek Hiemforth]

I was in the midst of writing a long post in response to this, but realized it might make a good Digital Hero article. So I think I'm going to work on it for publication instead. :D

[BlackSword]

I sided with the current majority and gave a definite 'sometimes.'

For plot points I usually require a roll. If it is something that is needed for an adventure and they fail I will find a way around that. If it is something that may help in the future but is not necessary then too bad. Then there are other times I want to glaze through something that is not terribly important, I will give a summary of the details and try to hint to move on (to the point that some of the players catch on and say, "So we get that information, but its not relelvant to the story so we move on.")

[Tech]

There are some common-sense things players simply do not have to roll for, such as the local burger joint, where the store is, etc etc. There are also some things that a GM shouldn't make the players roll for, if the GM really wants to give the players that information.

[Supreme Serpent]

I was in the midst of writing a long post in response to this, but realized it might make a good Digital Hero article. So I think I'm going to work on it for publication instead. :D

Make sure to include a section on Perception rolls. ;)

Player: "I go outside to see if it's daytime or nighttime."

GM: "Make a perception roll."

:doi:

[lemming]

I was in one game where we were trying to find our missing team mate. None of the present characters had any sort of investigative skills.

"So Scales you're sitting at the breakfast table watching Con-El have his cereal when you notice Janus' picture on the milk carton."

[Plex]

I'll do it if nobody has the skill- that's my fault for not planning better. Also, I'll do it if it is holding up the game from flowing. But I just don't hand out the information, I at least make them RP for it.

[pinecone]

I divide information into two catagorys...stuff an diligent and intelligent person could figure out (if he was in an action movie) and stuff an expert would know......so no skill? "It looks like it comes from south america", expert(ish)? "It Olmec, real early, based on the moteifs..."

[austenandrews]

In my experience, GMs use rolls not to determine if the PCs figure something out, but to see which PC figures something out.

[RDU Neil]

In my experience, GMs use rolls not to determine if the PCs figure something out, but to see which PC figures something out.

Or to determine how MUCH of something they figure out. Not enough to make headway... enough to get to the next clue... enough to jump straight to the big revelation... that kind of thing. YMMV.

[Dr. Anomaly]

Even if the PC has a directly applicable Knowledge skill, I generally ask for a skill check in any case.

Even if they fail it, I'll give them the bare-bones basics...because they have the relevant skill.

If they make the check, how much they make it by governs how much extra info, or how much detail, I give them.

:)

[Dust Raven]

I was in the midst of writing a long post in response to this, but realized it might make a good Digital Hero article. So I think I'm going to work on it for publication instead. :D

No fair! Now I'll have to pay to read it!

[Dust Raven]

Or to determine how MUCH of something they figure out. Not enough to make headway... enough to get to the next clue... enough to jump straight to the big revelation... that kind of thing. YMMV.

Exactly! :)

[TheEmerged]

There are issues with HERO where I represent the liberal side of the argument (like character rewrites), and there are issues where I represent the opposite extreme. This is one of those issues -- I fully understand that there are people who feel the other way and I hope they enjoy their style as much as I enjoy mine.

I wouldn't give characters free skills for the same reason I don't give them free powers. I might let them get away with making INT rolls under desperate situations (just like I'd allow them to do something different with a Power roll), but this is an exception and it won't work quite right (I'm a fan of the imfamous "second solution" method).

[David Blue]

How often do you, as a GM, give away information to the players without benefit of an appropriate skill?

"Do you have.... Science: Biology, or maybe KS: Agriculture?"
"No. But I lived on a farm in my origin story."
"Good enough. Here's what you find out..."

Just curious.I like to use all sorts of charcteristic rolls. This includes intelligence rolls where another gamemaster might ask for a specific skill.

I don't like the character to be defined too much by lots of specific skills. This is partly a question of sub-genre. For what I want, it's good if people routinely go "Hey, Doctor Brain, do you know ...?" in the sound expectation that being a smart guy in general, he will know. ("A professor of steamology must know these things.")

Here are some skills I like:
KS: General Knowledge - this lets me feed you all kinds of moderately useful trivia. It's better than nothing if you're clean out of ideas.
PS: Library Research - this is what Giles, Buffy the Vampire slayer's friend, has. It's useful for wizards, and more useful with a "library" laboratory.

These help "big brain" characters to be "just smart in general". Either the doc knows it, or he knows where to look it up - or he didn't know that, which may be interesting. ("You have done well, Biff. Zis intrigues me!")

[austenandrews]

Some of my old GMs had this habit, which would drive me nuts:

GM: "Does anyone know Theoretical Physics?"
Me: "I have an 8-less."
GM: "Roll it."
Me: "10. Missed by 2."
GM: "Sorry, you don't recognize the equations on the chalkboard."

(later)

GM: "Does anyone know about Ancient Egyptian Perfumes?"
Group: "No."
GM: "Okay, give me INT rolls."
Player Other Than Me: "10. Made it by 2."
GM: "Okay, you once read about this obscure perfume being used in the Lower Nile in 2000 BC..."

For that reason I'm quite generous about what a KS gives you without even bothering with a roll.

[David Blue]

Some of my old GMs had this habit, which would drive me nuts:

GM: "Does anyone know Theoretical Physics?"
Me: "I have an 8-less."
GM: "Roll it."
Me: "10. Missed by 2."
GM: "Sorry, you don't recognize the equations on the chalkboard."

(later)

GM: "Does anyone know about Ancient Egyptian Perfumes?"
Group: "No."
GM: "Okay, give me INT rolls."
Player Other Than Me: "10. Made it by 2."
GM: "Okay, you once read about this obscure perfume being used in the Lower Nile in 2000 BC..."

For that reason I'm quite generous about what a KS gives you without even bothering with a roll.Sure.

I think with an actual, specific knowledge skill, you should know everything of that difficulty or less automatically, and only roll for the cute stuff.

KS: Zombie-ology 14- should mean you just automatically know 90% of everything there is to know about zombies. You shouldn't be asked to roll except for the stuff that might fall into the last 10%.

[RDU Neil]

RE: Skill rolls...

I've always interpreted your base roll is "what you can do, under pressure, without really taking any time or using resources"

That is why a 14 or less skill roll is MASTER level... because this is what the guy does pulling it out of his @$$. Think what he could do with a little research and a calculator!

That's just me... so I'd be interested in hearing what you all think.

[David Blue]

RE: Skill rolls...

I've always interpreted your base roll is "what you can do, under pressure, without really taking any time or using resources"

That is why a 14 or less skill roll is MASTER level...I agree of course.

[Dust Raven]

RE: Skill rolls...

I've always interpreted your base roll is "what you can do, under pressure, without really taking any time or using resources"

That is why a 14 or less skill roll is MASTER level... because this is what the guy does pulling it out of his @$$. Think what he could do with a little research and a calculator!

That's just me... so I'd be interested in hearing what you all think.

That's a great way of looking at it. It also meshes with the rules for taking extra time and having help.

[OddHat]

RE: Skill rolls...

I've always interpreted your base roll is "what you can do, under pressure, without really taking any time or using resources"

That is why a 14 or less skill roll is MASTER level... because this is what the guy does pulling it out of his @$$. Think what he could do with a little research and a calculator!

That's just me... so I'd be interested in hearing what you all think.

Yup, agreed.

[HewhoisMatt]

I use the 8 or less rule based on their back ground, I might make it higher if it is somthing they really had a good chance of across. I don't use the INT roll because I work with alot of people who have their masters degrees but have ni idea whats going on in the world around them.


I'll use me as a example.

I have lived in Las Vegas most of my life and as a rule I do not gamble. I have dropped a buck or two a few times when standing around waiting for something or someone but thats about it. This being the case I still know how most of the games are played and what most of the lingo/jargon/slang used around them means. This is just something I have picked up but no one could really say I have the gambling skill or KS: Casinos. So if someone had a hero with the same background I would give him between a 8 or 10 as a target number unless it was something real easy like "Who is Steve Wynn".

[HewhoisMatt]

RE: Skill rolls...

I've always interpreted your base roll is "what you can do, under pressure, without really taking any time or using resources"

That is why a 14 or less skill roll is MASTER level... because this is what the guy does pulling it out of his @$$. Think what he could do with a little research and a calculator!

That's just me... so I'd be interested in hearing what you all think.


I would agree if not for the insane # of 15s and 16s I seem to roll. :weep:

[zornwil]

This is about how I do it. Something are obvious and need no skill roll.

However, I answered the Poll from the point of view of knowledge that would require a Skill Roll to know. I voted sometimes, because there are several different ways to hand over information. If no one in the group has an appropriate skill, or the guy with the appropriate skill flubs his roll, and I think the information is important but didn't want to just hand it to them free of charge, I've still gotta come up with some method of getting that info to them. I could just tell them anyway (oh, you failed by 4, well then you "only" know this...). I could have Henry the Expert show up ("well, what have you got there chaps? I haven't seen one of these in years!"). I could even post something on the evening news (This just in...). Or if I've made a DNPC roll for the session I can have a nosy DNPC know the answer and suddenly blurt it out (and then follow the heroes when they don't stop to listen to the rest of it because they must know).
Yeah, that's how I looked at it, I assumed that the more obvious/non-skill stuff was already factored out. I clicked "sometimes", similar to your answer, depends on the situation.

[zornwil]

RE: Skill rolls...

I've always interpreted your base roll is "what you can do, under pressure, without really taking any time or using resources"

That is why a 14 or less skill roll is MASTER level... because this is what the guy does pulling it out of his @$$. Think what he could do with a little research and a calculator!

That's just me... so I'd be interested in hearing what you all think.
I agree with this.

It gets more difficult, in my experience, when a player wants to do something very interesting or demanding over a period of time. This is where (as discussed in a previuos thread) the question comes up as to how often to make a Skill Roll, how much to enforce RPing, and to what degree the Skill Roll should really get an "extra time" bonus and how much of that time period is what it "should" take for the base roll owing to tremendous complexity or such.

[zornwil]

I use the 8 or less rule based on their back ground, I might make it higher if it is somthing they really had a good chance of across. I don't use the INT roll because I work with alot of people who have their masters degrees but have ni idea whats going on in the world around them.


I'll use me as a example.

I have lived in Las Vegas most of my life and as a rule I do not gamble. I have dropped a buck or two a few times when standing around waiting for something or someone but thats about it. This being the case I still know how most of the games are played and what most of the lingo/jargon/slang used around them means. This is just something I have picked up but no one could really say I have the gambling skill or KS: Casinos. So if someone had a hero with the same background I would give him between a 8 or 10 as a target number unless it was something real easy like "Who is Steve Wynn".
Steve Wynn the musician?

Anyway, it's probably fair to say that Las Vegas folks get an Everyman Skill in KS: Casinos.

[RDU Neil]

I agree with this.

It gets more difficult, in my experience, when a player wants to do something very interesting or demanding over a period of time. This is where (as discussed in a previuos thread) the question comes up as to how often to make a Skill Roll, how much to enforce RPing, and to what degree the Skill Roll should really get an "extra time" bonus and how much of that time period is what it "should" take for the base roll owing to tremendous complexity or such.

If the long term "something" is difficult, but proven possible within the context of the game world... then I start by assuming they will succeed... then role play out "how long... what resources?" before I make them roll. The roll is then the judge of "how effective/quick was the process"

Just make the roll... "You are going to be at this for weeks, with lots of delays in getting resources, failed attempts etc."

Make the roll by 10... "It falls together in just days. Everything clicks and you have a working prototype well under the deadline" etc.

If they fail the role, I assume that something comes up that interrupts/stops the process that is out of their control.

(So, for non-pressure situations... extra time is considered a gimmee... the roll just helps to direct the role playing aspects.)

------

For a totally new, outlandish, outside the normal world parameters concept like "I'm going to invent machine guns in the fantasy campaign!" Then it becomes a series of rolls totally worked into role playing. So, concept roll... how solid is your initial idea. Plan roll. How effective is your initial plan. (Roll really badly, you think it's a great plan and the project fails because you can't see how flawed your original idea is, or something.)

This becomes a lot more role played, many many rolls on the skill roll, etc.


It ain't perfect, but for the few times this has actually come up in my years of gaming... it has worked pretty well.

[Sean Waters]

How often do you, as a GM, give away information to the players...

Giving away information to the players.

Hmmm.

Interesting concept. I might try it sometime. :)

[DangerousDan]

I would agree if not for the insane # of 15s and 16s I seem to roll. :weep:

I have a PC who has that same problem with activation rolls. Almost everything he has involves a 14- or 15- activation roll. He activates about half the time. A session where he doesn't at least one time have three failures in a row is unusual. :think:

[DangerousDan]

I have a wide range of levels of information that I may pass on to the players under various circumstances.

The blatantly obvious, no roll is even considered: "To the North, you see a range of snow-capped mountains."
The blatantly obvious, mixed with something that might be missed: "Make a perception roll with no skills." "by 1? To the North, you see a range... You also see a small brown speck between you and the mountain, slowly moving to the West." If no one makes the perception roll by a sufficient amount (chosen rather arbitrarily before I ask for the roll), they only see the mountains.
The blatantly obvious, but requiring skill to interepret: "You see tracks in the mud, <describe tracks (if the biologist had been present, she would have had a significant chance of identifying the animal at this point, and even a near miss would have produced a little more information)> <request tracking roll> and you have no trouble following them from the animal pen across the freshly planted field and toward the river. It appears to have been dragging the sheep all the way."
The really obscure: "You've got xxxxxx and yyyy skills, don't you? Roll yyyy as a complementary to xxxxxx and tell me what you come up with. By four? You know that it is alien, but other than that, you don't have a clue."
Sometimes I'll allow an INT roll for a character to have a guess, but have someone with the appropriate skill roll to know.
Some information, the characters will only be able to find if they are actively seeking it with the correct skills. A skill roll may or may not be required, but the seeking is.
Sometimes I will prod them into looking. I do this very carefully, because I usually don't want them to know what it is they are looking for. This can occasionally result in them looking for and finding things that even I didn't know were there. :shock:
Eyes Only Top Secret: information I may tell the players after the game is concluded with no possibility of restart.


To make a long story short ("too late!"), I divide information into four categories: 1) easy to perceive and easy to interpret, 2) easy to perceive, but difficult to interpret, 3) hard to perceive but easy to interpret, and 4) hard-hard.

Until I wrote this post, I never really realized that I do it that way. (obviously this falls in category 3 :yes: )

[RDU Neil]

I have a wide range of levels of information that I may pass on to the players under various circumstances.

The blatantly obvious, no roll is even considered: "To the North, you see a range of snow-capped mountains."
The blatantly obvious, mixed with something that might be missed: "Make a perception roll with no skills." "by 1? To the North, you see a range... You also see a small brown speck between you and the mountain, slowly moving to the West." If no one makes the perception roll by a sufficient amount (chosen rather arbitrarily before I ask for the roll), they only see the mountains.
The blatantly obvious, but requiring skill to interepret: "You see tracks in the mud, <describe tracks (if the biologist had been present, she would have had a significant chance of identifying the animal at this point, and even a near miss would have produced a little more information)> <request tracking roll> and you have no trouble following them from the animal pen across the freshly planted field and toward the river. It appears to have been dragging the sheep all the way."
The really obscure: "You've got xxxxxx and yyyy skills, don't you? Roll yyyy as a complementary to xxxxxx and tell me what you come up with. By four? You know that it is alien, but other than that, you don't have a clue."
Sometimes I'll allow an INT roll for a character to have a guess, but have someone with the appropriate skill roll to know.
Some information, the characters will only be able to find if they are actively seeking it with the correct skills. A skill roll may or may not be required, but the seeking is.
Sometimes I will prod them into looking. I do this very carefully, because I usually don't want them to know what it is they are looking for. This can occasionally result in them looking for and finding things that even I didn't know were there. :shock:
Eyes Only Top Secret: information I may tell the players after the game is concluded with no possibility of restart.


To make a long story short ("too late!"), I divide information into four categories: 1) easy to perceive and easy to interpret, 2) easy to perceive, but difficult to interpret, 3) hard to perceive but easy to interpret, and 4) hard-hard.

Until I wrote this post, I never really realized that I do it that way. (obviously this falls in category 3 :yes: )


Good point... as Perception and Understanding are two different things. I don't think I'm as cut and dried as you are... but both play into whether a roll for seeing/knowing is necessary or not.

[Chromatic]

The corillary question: Does skill level matter in the decision to "give away" information?

ie - does the fact that your team of grunts don't have a single science skill greater than 8- among them sway your decision to be free flowing?

does the fact that your team of heros are all super intelligent with various focuses of study ( mage, detective, doctor, mystic, scientist ) all at exhorbitantly high levels (20- or more) make it easier to just hand wave, you already know this......

I say it depends on the campaign, what's happening with the current scenario, and how important the information be known is to getting near the desired end state of the scenario. (what, you as a GM don't have a planned end state? Not to say a scripted result, but more of a desired outcome (hero X gets captured, or master plan becomes discovered)

[GaryB]

For my game, depends on the relevance of the information.

Lately, the players are haunted by an ex-character who is a digital construct. The world goes dark and looks like a film that went slightly off track. They can see her speak but cannot hear her. Little do they realize how much Lipreading would come in handy (and I let them know that this is the case).

My players seem to loll around a lot as if they haven't been given any information. Yet I have given them plenty of information they seem to dismiss. Since none of them have deduction, they rarely put it together. Sometimes this tends to slow the overall campaign but I need to draw the line for characters who dont seem to want to invest much in skills or use contacts that THEY HAVE.

Then of course, information just falls on thier lap and they do well with an immediate situation as long as it seems to be obvious. This I will be using against them soon enough. Muahahaha. Without a good skill base you can pretty much lead your PC's around by the nose and put them into pretty grim situations.

[RDU Neil]

For my game, depends on the relevance of the information.

Lately, the players are haunted by an ex-character who is a digital construct. The world goes dark and looks like a film that went slightly off track. They can see her speak but cannot hear her. Little do they realize how much Lipreading would come in handy (and I let them know that this is the case).

My players seem to loll around a lot as if they haven't been given any information. Yet I have given them plenty of information they seem to dismiss. Since none of them have deduction, they rarely put it together. Sometimes this tends to slow the overall campaign but I need to draw the line for characters who dont seem to want to invest much in skills or use contacts that THEY HAVE.

Then of course, information just falls on thier lap and they do well with an immediate situation as long as it seems to be obvious. This I will be using against them soon enough. Muahahaha. Without a good skill base you can pretty much lead your PC's around by the nose and put them into pretty grim situations.

Sounds like you might have some player problems... but I might be misreading. Sounds like, even if the characters were skill fiends, the PLAYERS aren't able to, or don't desire to, put together puzzles and figure things out. They are looking to be given something to react against that is very "in your face." Not looking for subtlety or mystery.

If you enjoy being able to lead characters around by the nose and make them look stupid after a while, that's fine... but I'd be really frustrated if the players weren't trying to figure things out, and instead they just looked to the GM to "entertain them" with the event of the week. That would really, REALLY bug me, in fact.

[GaryB]

Well, the one thing you have to understand is 3 out of 4 were totally new to the HERO system and I think were intimidated. They are getting better and relaxing a bit more. My story line isn't a simple affair either, so probably part of that is my fault.

They are doing better, and I have NPC's in the process of training thier minds to use thier resources better.

Thier original NPC administrator held an attitude of "Well, do what you can". The new 'Colonel Heartman' that is thier current admin is a lot more active in what they should do and I think it inspired them into more decisive action. The Colonel is much like R. Lee Ermy (playing in Full Metal Jacket) in a lot of respects. Wants results and wants them now now now. He's willing to help them along and train the team into a well oiled machine. They seem to like the interaction...of course...this means thier old administrator has been exiled and outlawed as well for unknown reasons.

[Mike W]

Well, sometimes it isn't a skill roll. Sometimes, they can make a contact roll and see what the contact knows, or an INT roll to remember something. And villains with reputations don't require rolls for people with the appropriate KS to get basic info(more specific details do require a roll though). And I have a newspaper that feeds the players stories/info - although that is usually not much more than a short hook or a minimal recap of something the characters publicly did, with the occasional "NPC Hero X captures Villain Y" headline thrown in.

[Vondy]

If the character would reasonably know something because of their background, and doesn't leverage it all the time, then I provide the information as a matter of course. I might recommend, if it comes up on a regular basis, that they purchase an 8- roll with it (I generally only make characters roll in unusual circumstances, under stress, if the feat is normally past their abilities, or if its a plot point (picking the lock to the king's treasury, etc)), which is sufficient for most things.

[zornwil]

The corillary question: Does skill level matter in the decision to "give away" information?

ie - does the fact that your team of grunts don't have a single science skill greater than 8- among them sway your decision to be free flowing?

does the fact that your team of heros are all super intelligent with various focuses of study ( mage, detective, doctor, mystic, scientist ) all at exhorbitantly high levels (20- or more) make it easier to just hand wave, you already know this......

I say it depends on the campaign, what's happening with the current scenario, and how important the information be known is to getting near the desired end state of the scenario. (what, you as a GM don't have a planned end state? Not to say a scripted result, but more of a desired outcome (hero X gets captured, or master plan becomes discovered)
You're trying to make me tip my hand...

Seriously, I will tend to give away stuff more to those highly specialized, I suppose there's an informal "casual skill" level where you figure someone would almost necessarily notice or know something. I agree plot plays a big role, and on occassion a poor plot can result from grossly missing how transparent the plot may really have been, but often even that can be mitigated with players being "gentlemanly" and not exploiting where it violates genre constructs (which often inform absurdities).

[Vondy]

You're trying to make me tip my hand...

Seriously, I will tend to give away stuff more to those highly specialized, I suppose there's an informal "casual skill" level where you figure someone would almost necessarily notice or know something. I agree plot plays a big role, and on occassion a poor plot can result from grossly missing how transparent the plot may really have been, but often even that can be mitigated with players being "gentlemanly" and not exploiting where it violates genre constructs (which often inform absurdities).

This is why I make my players put their everyman skills on the character sheet, and define the ones that need defining. The character starts with a cuk 8- and hometown or region 8- a profession like "grew up on the farm" 11- and a hobby at 8-. The cuk should cover most situations where "an ordinary person in this society knows this."

[CourtFool]

I do not require skill rolls for information most people would know. I like to encourage skills, so I frequently ask if someone has a relavent skill. I often do not require a skill roll if I feel their skill level is sufficient to know the information. I just hate when someone has the appropriate skill and then blows a roll. To me, the whole point of buying that skill was so their character can shine in that one moment. I do not want chance to steal it from them.

[RDU Neil]

You're trying to make me tip my hand...

Seriously, I will tend to give away stuff more to those highly specialized, I suppose there's an informal "casual skill" level where you figure someone would almost necessarily notice or know something. I agree plot plays a big role, and on occassion a poor plot can result from grossly missing how transparent the plot may really have been, but often even that can be mitigated with players being "gentlemanly" and not exploiting where it violates genre constructs (which often inform absurdities).


If I needed a sig line, I would have found one here.

Genre constructs often inform absurdities.

Goes right to the heart of why I don't like Four Color/Silver Age (or extreme Iron Age)... I just have a low tolerance for the absurd. (As opposed to the unrealistic, which is fine... ridiculous and absurd are not.)

[Vondy]

Of what do they inform the absurdities, is my question.

[RDU Neil]

Of what do they inform the absurdities, is my question.

"My secret identity is safe, now that I have my domino mask on!"

"Uh... how in the world does THAT work?"

"It is GENRE, you plebian!"


(Or something like that.)

[Vondy]

"My secret identity is safe, now that I have my domino mask on!"

"Uh... how in the world does THAT work?"

"It is GENRE, you plebian!"


(Or something like that.)

It was a play on words. Never mind.

[RDU Neil]

It was a play on words. Never mind.

Ah... I see now.


"The weather" then.

[DangerousDan]

It was a play on words. Never mind.

Von D-Man, sometimes you can be so subtle--and yet, I think you have in you, the capacity to be as blunt as an entire planet.

[Vondy]

Von D-Man, sometimes you can be so subtle--and yet, I think you have in you, the capacity to be as blunt as an entire planet.

I swing both ways, baby.

[CourtFool]

I swing both ways, baby.

I knew it! Do you swing with llamas?