Brian Stanfield

On 1/28/2021 at 4:06 PM, Thia Halmades said:

nope.

 

Still lost.

 

I’ll try again: so they roll dice behind a screen and don’t see their own results?

Something like that. Players like to roll dice because it makes them feel like they have control over their own fate. But sometimes you don’t want them to know the result. My guess was to use a box and let them shake it or something like that. Behind a screen works too. Mostly I was just curious if anyone has ever used a particular approach to doing this. For some reason this thread turned into some sort of “trust issues” rant. 

@Steve Long Maybe you should consider setting up a Patreon campaign or something like that. There are enough people here who I’d imagine would throw in a little cash on a regular basis to help support the Q&A forum. 

On 1/15/2021 at 12:34 PM, Thia Halmades said:

If I understood your question, does anyone make hidden rolls on behalf of the player.

The opposite, actually: allowing players to make the rolls themselves, but keeping the results hidden (like in a covered box or a shaker or something). The idea is that if they roll a 9 on their Stealth Skill, they have a pretty good expectation of it having worked. If they roll a 16, they'll know it probably didn't. But if they roll a ?, it opens up for a lot of role playing possibilities. Did they hear me sneak into the room behind them? Do I keep hiding for a moment to be sure? Do I go ahead assume surprise and line up an attack? Can I take extra time to take aim without them noticing? That sort of thing. 

It was just an idea I'd been playing with in my head, and wondered if anyone had any experience with this sort of thing. 

On 1/3/2021 at 11:05 AM, Brian Stanfield said:

 

I would totally agree here, except that I once saw Ernie solve the problem of "not eating crackers in your bed" by eating crackers in Bert's bed instead. Some crackers (albeit very few) really do matter to some beds.

 

But in the spirit of your overall message, we do in fact tend to take ourselves waaaaay to seriously in these discussions, and probably do deserve to sleep in the beds we make for ourselves, crackers or no. 

Aaaannnnnnnd just like that, I came home from chemotherapy on Thursday and found myself eating crackers in bed . . . .

Thanks everyone. I didn't mean to ghost my own topic. I had to start chemotherapy again with very short notice and my time and energy has been taken up with that.

I always forget about the list of pre-rolled results made by the players themselves. That seems like an obvious solution to the mechanical problems I was having a hard time with. Lots of good input on when to do it as well. Thanks for the suggestions!

17 minutes ago, Barton said:

I sometimes make hidden roles, but only when it makes sense, like sometimes PER rolls or deduction rolls [when players are tying to think of ideas what to do next].

Tell me about how you conduct the rolls . . .

It's been a while since I've posted, but I miss those long gameplay discussions with lots of great bits of advice. So here goes:

I've been fiddling with the idea for a while to use hidden or secret die rolls for certain types of situations. I've never really liked having the GM do all the rolls behind a screen because it takes away, at least on the surface, from player agency (some of us remember the bad old days of D&D using this tactic). But sometimes you don't want your players to know if they've succeeded, or by how much.

Some examples could be: 

• a stealth roll while trying to hide from a pursuer. Did he see you hide around the corner? Are you sure?
• you set an explosive to go off at a certain time after you leave. Will it succeed? 
• you want that guy at the bar to give up some information. You try to use a Persuasion roll, but did it work?
• you're absolutely positive that you take a right at the fork in the road to get back to the rendezvous point. You roll an Intelligence check, but did you succeed, or was it a critical failure?

You get the idea. I want to avoid meta-gaming the rolls and to leave some doubt in the players' minds. There is a lot of potential value in these sorts of results remaining secret from the players. But how to conduct the rolls without leaving them feeling scammed?

My thought was to use a box, throw in the proper dice, and let the players shake it without seeing the results. They get to make their own rolls, so they don't feel cheated, but they also don't actually know the result. 

Has anyone done this before? Am I missing some obvious drawbacks to this approach? Are there better ways of doing it? 

I'd like to pull from the collective experience of everyone here. Let me know what you've tried, what's worked, and also what hasn't.

Got it. If you ever see fit to trust my conscientious use of font you can send me a private message!  😉

1 minute ago, Simon said:

Yes (though there are ways around it). I truly dislike folks changing fonts.

That's a dirty trick! Out of curiosity, does changing the font create a problem for you as an administrator? Or is is a potential uniformity issue?

We used to be able to use different fonts in our posts. I used to start every post with [font=times] in order to get a serif font, because as my editor friend once said, "Sans Serif fonts are an abomination!" I like to use the Times font mostly because it makes italics much easier to see in a post, and I do like to use my italics.

That trick doesn't work anymore. Has it simply been weeded out with the latest update of the HERO site? Just curious . . . .

21 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

crackers absolutely do _not_ matter

I would totally agree here, except that I once saw Ernie solve the problem of "not eating crackers in your bed" by eating crackers in Bert's bed instead. Some crackers (albeit very few) really do matter to some beds.

But in the spirit of your overall message, we do in fact tend to take ourselves waaaaay to seriously in these discussions, and probably do deserve to sleep in the beds we make for ourselves, crackers or no. 

Yosemite Sam? I mean, c'mon, he's the rootin'est, tootin'est, gosh-darn shootin'est . . . .

21 hours ago, ScrewySquirrel said:

is there a way to look at ALL my posts, going back well, as far as my first post, however long that was?  I haven't found a way to look back at more than a few most recent posts

It may not be what you're looking for, but I think it is: go to your "Profile," then click on "See my activity," and then scroll down on the left to "Posts," and it should get you want you want.

15 hours ago, Greywind said:

And, obviously, a public one.

The private message said, "I'm sending you a public message," thus closing the circle and starting a paradoxical black hole.

On 8/19/2020 at 2:54 PM, absavvy said:

Hey All,

 

I just recently came across Champions again after almost 40 years. 

brings back so many memories and now i need to find character sheets so I can share my excitement with my now 10 year old daughter ( same age as when I first played Champions) .

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I'm sending you a private message.

10 hours ago, Astromath said:

Thx.  Just what I needed.  Though, I wish it was editable.  Example:  some of the GM Screens do have product numbers (I own copies from back in the 80s).

By the way, take a look at Sheet 2. It appears to have most of the product numbers that you are looking for. Sheets 1 & 3 are notes and stuff that Duke made for himself.

6 hours ago, Astromath said:

Thx.  Just what I needed.  Though, I wish it was editable.  Example:  some of the GM Screens do have product numbers (I own copies from back in the 80s).

Fire of a message to @Duke Bushido and give hime that info. I'm positive he'd want it and would add it to the list.

Duke has a link in his signature for what you are looking for. He'd point you that way, but since he's unavailable right now I'll add it right here for you: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1BYuTpC3Xg3xWgFQXEvIJC__QLHojYkvsP8IHCW1_4qI/edit#gid=0

Thanks, Duke . . .uh . . . Goodwin.

6 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

Oh-- if you were wondering (and you probably weren't) about just how strong the tires are--  One of them has (had) two small holes all the way through the tread, about three-sixteenths of an inch in diameter.  There is (sorry; was) _no_ air in the tire.  And I drove three hours on it.  Why not?  It wasn't flat.     The new tires have the euro-standard load range, and call it a 145.  They have a weight rating of around 6800 pounds each and eighteen-ply sidewalls.  

 

And they ride like absolute _crap_ when the Leviathan isn't loaded.   

I had some 12-ply tires on my Ram and they are almost indestructible, and boy do they ride rough! I say almost indestructible because I had to park the truck in a strange spot at work (when I was still working two jobs and doing construction) and had a two-inch puncture from who-knows-what?! Even those bad boys couldn’t withstand random shards of steel. Oh, and an emergency break stand on the highway to avoid a collision shaved one of the other tires flat on one side. So now I have everything arranged like you, only opposite: I rotated the two 12-plys to the rear, and two new normal tires up front.  

8 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

How many people are interested in maps as play aids?  I ask because _I_ love them, as does the youth group and both of my remaining adult groups.

 

I ask because AC is _filled_ with tiny maps.  I am curious to see if there is any interest in an Adventurers Club Map Pack-- I can take much higher rez scans-- high enough to enlarge these maps to 1 hex = 1 inch without loosing detail or getting pixelated.  It's more work on the pile, but if there are enough 5e-and-back players (sorry; I don't have the time to rescale individual elements of the map itself for 6e's 1"=1m scale), I might consider taking it on after the BBB project.

+1 on the Map Pack!

Hey, this new "Dump on Duke" game is kinda fun!

10 hours ago, Duke Bushido said:

11 + DCV - Defender's OCV = target number.  Roll that number or less. 

Duke! I think you’ve been working too much this week! Hopefully you get some time off for Independence Day so your brain can recuperate. 

Just to recap: just think of an attack as a Skill roll. The degree of a Skill roll often determines how much success you have, so if you make it by a lot it is better than making it by a little. The lower you roll, the more you make the Skill roll by, and for an attack that difference is how good of an opponent you can hit. The lower the roll, the more DCV you can hit. 

Keep coming back to that. Make up a couple of sample combats for your own practice. Create some environmental conditions (darkness, terrain, whatever) and use a few of the maneuvers that modify OCV and DCV, and run a few rounds of combat. It'll get you used to the basic formula plus adding modifiers and stuff as you calculate.