(A) Dungeon-specific Difficulties – trash post
Last time I was talking about trying to make attributes more specific or thief skill more general. This time I wanted to check out the concept of empty character and full world.
The notion of fixed (for example) X-in-6 chance to do something inevitably comes from invention of thief during newborn years of the hobby. But it seems to be wrong side first. I mean, it depends mostly on the number provided on the sheet and not really on the situation. Or rather – characters capabilities are first in line while the actual challenge is in the background. Of course GM can adjust your Lockpicking for a given roll due to circumstances but still – the game presents itself as character capabilities comes first, as if character was their own difficulty.
I know it’s not a new idea. But somehow it looks really enticing to me especially as a part of dungeon crawl. Instead of classes getting predetermined chances on success I’d like to see dungeon specific difficulties. Like dungeon room 1 has doors: 2-in-6 to lockpick, 3-in-6 to force open and 1-in-6 to listen at them and get idea what’s next.
Also could be used for other things. There is a chasm going through the room or hallway? 3-in-6 unless you use some tools and stuff. Characters could have like from -1 up to +2 chances for given activities (or groups of them) but main difficulty is based on the adventure. Want to make something rather obvious? 5-in-6 to detect, so chance is very high but still – some characters may not sense it, whole group may miss it with very bad rolls.
Maybe also gated class-specific things? 1-in-6 for everyone unless you are magic-user (4-in-6)? Anyone could sneak there with 3-in-6 chance but thieves do it by default? Climbing, hiding, detecting, opening and doing things, just slap a number from 1 to 5 and let them try. And if they fail first time maybe they’d use resources with another shot. It would also be fun for quick dungeons – just assign each room rating 0-5 and here you go, every difficulty is basically on X-in-6 scale. Want to change things? Go for X-in-10 or 2d6 roll over X or something.
Does this post takes us anywhere? No, not really. I mean, I started working on Failed Donut OSR RPG once again (from scratch) and I certainly don’t want to do whatever I presented here. But I think of ways how to make tests in dungeons more interactive and fun from adventure description. And this is one of the ways, I guess it would make a step for even more minimal character sheet – just a name, notes and equipment.