OOC THREAD

[tomcat]

All right guys, here is the hold up...and maybe you guys can help me break open some logic here.

First, let me explain what my goal is:

I want to make the search for Ruithel a fun challenge, but not just your standard roll 10 successes before 4 failures and you find her.  I want to make it dynamic and have the path of the orcs fluctuate, as much as your own. I want to make an "if - then" kind of set up - or search web.

The idea is you guys would roll a Hunting test and dependent on the roll, it would take you one direction on the web to whatever pre-positioned encounter, or hazard, or nothing that might be at that location. I have attached a picture to try an illustrate what I am talking about.

So essentially, the party is starting at the circle of called Clan Argil. You guys made your first successful Hunting skill and it moved you to the first start location of the web. Now, here is where it becomes an issue.

I have run a number of dice tests over the last three days based on Grimbeorn's hunting skill and the results are staggering the number of successes for his PC. The predominant number of successes are at the TN's based on the region - 16, 18, and 20. So, it is little challenge for Grimbeorn to follow along the standard challenges to the eventual success of finding Ruithel along the web.

So, I thought I'd do an aggregate based TN for a prolonged action which would require all of you to roll a hunting roll and the sum of your rolls would determine which direction you moved on the web. Everyone rolls and the sum is 41 and I would compare that to the TN's on the web and a range of 36-39 would be the confluence, a 40-41 would be a non-fordable river encounter, and 42+ would mean the right direction AND finding the ford.

This takes out the standard TN's that are becoming negligible in many instances now. It also would mean a Hope point really does matter and would become a valuable limited resource.

This worked out well, but it removes the value of the   , the   , and the  . The goal being that a great or extraordinary success would make a double step towards success, where a   might make a triple step. What I mean by this is, you guys wouldn't be going all the way to Gundabad, having caught up tp her along the way. The   would mean an encounter or a Hazard...well, in my test rolls   's were a rarity and I thought, what is the fun in that?

I've looked at the standard Journey rules and again, the TN's are kind of becoming a joke. In my test rolls of the feat die and 3 success dice, I hit the Daunting TN 6 out of 12 times and one of those rolls was considered an Epic result with a     .

Now I don't want to drag our game into some mechanical nightmare, but I would love to have a little exploration into using skill challenges that give us neat results. In my pic, you see that if a failed roll out of Argil's camp is made, you go to the confluence of the rivers - and you can't ford there. Well, I have to jack the TN up pretty high to make it a challenge and there is no justification for it.

So I am running this out to you guys - what do you all think? What would be a cool play of using skills in this format? How would you tie in the special dice? I want it to get to the point where you guys might despair and hope needs to play a part. I also want it to reflect that if you guys DO get a streak of good rolls, that not only are you on the right path of the web, you are catching up to the kidnappers.

It is not my intent to ruin your fun in the game, but I don't want our game held up much more. So, I am looking to my analytically minded friends to see what you would do. If no one has any input, I will just come up with a simple play and we can move on. But I'd rather have some neat thing that isn't a railroad, isn't necessarily easy or difficult, but based on chance (and some skill). I want a failed roll to have you guys happen upon a orc gathering, or a blighted location, while a success moves you closer to Ruithel.

[Telcontar]

My initial thought is roll dependant story advancement usually means bad game session where you roll and roll waiting for a sucess. I dont think that is what you are doing and I'll think about this somemore because I understand your intent.

What about rolls scalling the difficulty?

[Telcontar]

But with branches.

Route A and B
One is harder due to rolls and one may be faster but lead to a1 and b1 not to C. Something like that.

[Eclecticon]

The above is a good idea. 

If I were running this, I'd swipe the chase rules from another game (Feng Shui, Night's Black Agents and Unknown Armies are all good examples) and use them as a model.  The orcs (and Ruthiel) start a certain number of abstract lengths away.  This doesn't increase unless we royally fuck something up, so it's player-facing - it's all about our efforts to go faster than their constant speed.  Failed Hunting rolls (or whatever - come up with some flimsy justification for it not to make it depend on a single skill) cause Hazard episodes as we cut corners that we shouldn't.  Successful rolls bring opportunities - the orcs decided not to ford a river at spot A, but we can do it if we make some combination of rolls, and that gets us a length closer to our quarry.  The TNs for these can be pretty high - we're explicitly doing things that a party of orcs decided were too risky. 

Also, demand periodic Travel rolls a step, maybe two, above the normal TN.  Nearly half the company is walking wounded, and we're trying to go faster than orcs returning from a raid, so we're not taking the time to catch food, gather firewood or choose optimal shelters.  That should wear us down enough that we'll need to come up with something clever when we do catch our quarry. 

[tomcat]

All right - I have my thoughts together on how we'll do this...I hope it proves fun.

I will give a set of instructions tomorrow when I start our next post.

Good night for now!

[tomcat]

Dropbox is killing their public folder option on March 15th.

That is where I generally host all the pics that I place in posts (not the attachments). I will need to find another source, but if anyone knows of a way to easily allow you to see stuff in that folder, let me know.

Thanks!

[Telcontar]

What about google drive?

[tomcat]

Google Drive already does what Dropbox is going to - I can share all the files I want as links, but cannot point directly to the file so it shows up as an image.

[Telcontar]

Does it make a difference if you have a dropbox account? If we all have dropbox accounts could we use the folder as a collaborative tool instead of a public folder?

[tomcat]

I can share with public as much as I wish. I just can't use the link as a pointer to put the image directly in the the post for flavor.

Like on our character profiles - those images will soon not appear as images, but links. The link will take you, but it won't automatically project it as a pic.

[Eclecticon]

I resurrected my old Photobucket account for picture-in-post capacity.  The ads are annoying, but otherwise it seems to be working fine so far.

[tomcat]

After perusing the Cubicle7 Forums and getting some basic ideas, here is what I have come up with for Trolls. The books do not define their flaw for turning to stone when touched by the sun's light, as was witnessed in the Hobbit.

Now in the Hobbit, those were Hill Trolls and the Gandalf and Bilbo used the sun wisely. In the canon, Tolkien states that only the Olag-hai (Black Trolls that Sauron kept in Mordor) could withstand the sun. But he doesn't necessarily state what happens to Cave Trolls, Stone Trolls, Ettens, etc.  Gandalf is quoted as saying:

It seemed that the evil power in Mirkwood had been driven out by the White Council only to reappear in greater strength in the old strongholds in Mordor. The Dark Tower had been rebuilt, it was said. From there the power was spreading far and wide, and away far east and south there were wars and growing fear. Orcs were multiplying again in the mountains. Trolls were abroad, no longer dull-witted, but cunning and armed with dreadful weapons. - The Lord of the Rings, Book 1, Chapter 2 "The Shadow of the Past"

Tolkien's position was that all Trolls other than the Olog-hai would be considered to be Trolls of the Twilight. As such, they were all vulnerable to Sunlight. I'm not even certain that the Olog-hai were entirely immune if they were freed of Sauron's control.

All of this said, the TOR game does not define a flaw mechanic for Trolls if they are exposed to sunlight. If anything is said, it is vague and leaves it to the Loremaster to determine for his or her game.

So, I created the following flaw for all trolls (except Olag-hai)...

Stone Take You All - if the creature possesses this trait and is exposed to sunlight, they will begin to lose Hate points at a rate of 2 per combat round. If the creature's Hate is reduced to 0, while being exposed to the light of day, they will turn to stone the same round that all Hate points are consumed.

Let me know if you guys have any thoughts or adds.

Thanks!

[disench4nted]

I like that it isn't instant, so even if we get it into sunlight it can still have a final chance to ruin our day. That seems "realistic" to me.

[Telcontar]

Yeah, sounds good to me, hate is an elegant way to address it.

[tomcat]

Dropbox has officially killed the Public folder, so all the pics I have as HTML are now just broken links.

I am still working out a way to fix this.

I will get images back up soon.