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*Dungeons & Dragons
Failure stakes for a travel Skill Challenge
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7564914" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>I think this is one usage of "fail forward", but not the only one and in my view not the primary one. "Fail forward" in a game like Burning Wheel is a way of adjudicating a character's <em>failure to meet his/her goal</em>.</p><p></p><p>In BW, action declaration requires a declaration of both <em>intent</em> and <em>task</em>. If the player's check succeeds, then the PC succeeds at the task and achieves his/her intent. If the player's check fails, then the GM has to establish the consequences of failure, and is encouraged to focus on <em>intent</em> as much as or moreso than <em>task</em> when narrating failure - so the character may succeed at the task but not realise the desired intent.</p><p></p><p>In the context of a travel skill challenge, we know that task is <em>travel from X to Y</em>. But what is intent? If it is simply <em>make it from X to Y</em>, then maybe there is really nothing at stake at all - and then the GM might just "say 'yes" and/or call for some simple roll to determine what/how many resources are lost (this is pretty much what [MENTION=82106]AbdulAlhazred[/MENTION] suggested upthread, I think).</p><p></p><p>But if intent is <em>arrive within time</em> or <em>arrive without having spent all our rations</em> or whatever, then that might provide a focus for the narration of failure (similar to [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s famous example of the character climbing the mountain with the intent of finding the pudding (?) at the top, and running the risk of losing his/her pudding detecting wand in the course of the trek).</p><p></p><p>For there to be a chance of not making it from X to Y <em>at all</em>, then there needs to be some reason in the fiction why the PCs mightn't make it, and that should be part of the intent eg <em>we travel from X to Y without getting lost</em>, or <em>we travel from X to Y without being caught by the Ringwraiths who are hunting for us</em>. If there is nothing of this sort that emerges from the fiction, then that makes it a good candidate for "saying 'yes'" rather than framing a check.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7564914, member: 42582"] I think this is one usage of "fail forward", but not the only one and in my view not the primary one. "Fail forward" in a game like Burning Wheel is a way of adjudicating a character's [I]failure to meet his/her goal[/I]. In BW, action declaration requires a declaration of both [I]intent[/I] and [I]task[/I]. If the player's check succeeds, then the PC succeeds at the task and achieves his/her intent. If the player's check fails, then the GM has to establish the consequences of failure, and is encouraged to focus on [I]intent[/I] as much as or moreso than [I]task[/I] when narrating failure - so the character may succeed at the task but not realise the desired intent. In the context of a travel skill challenge, we know that task is [I]travel from X to Y[/I]. But what is intent? If it is simply [I]make it from X to Y[/I], then maybe there is really nothing at stake at all - and then the GM might just "say 'yes" and/or call for some simple roll to determine what/how many resources are lost (this is pretty much what [MENTION=82106]AbdulAlhazred[/MENTION] suggested upthread, I think). But if intent is [I]arrive within time[/I] or [I]arrive without having spent all our rations[/I] or whatever, then that might provide a focus for the narration of failure (similar to [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s famous example of the character climbing the mountain with the intent of finding the pudding (?) at the top, and running the risk of losing his/her pudding detecting wand in the course of the trek). For there to be a chance of not making it from X to Y [I]at all[/I], then there needs to be some reason in the fiction why the PCs mightn't make it, and that should be part of the intent eg [I]we travel from X to Y without getting lost[/I], or [I]we travel from X to Y without being caught by the Ringwraiths who are hunting for us[/I]. If there is nothing of this sort that emerges from the fiction, then that makes it a good candidate for "saying 'yes'" rather than framing a check. [/QUOTE]
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