Dice Pools, Grades, and Difficulties

Primitive Screwhead · Apr 22, 2016

I will start by admitting that I am not totally clear of the play-test material.. sometimes rules just stick in my head.

Die pools consist of Stat + skill + equipment.
This is capped by the characters Grade, for starting characters this is 5D6.
Average roll = 18. Max roll = 30

Climbing a brick wall is a 'strenuous' task, with a difficulty score of 25. You have to be at least 8th Grade to be at a 50/50 chance of success, and at least 11th grade to have the odds in your favor.

Yes, its a brick wall and is hard to free-climb. But since equipment is included in the die pool before capping, it would not make a difference if you have the best climbing gear set in the entire world {and knew how to use it}.. until you had a higher grade.

I know on the combat side the intent is to encourage maneuvering and use of flanking/cross-fire/mobility, but that leaves very little room for trading accuracy for damage.

- Bandit, grade 5, Melee defense of 21

- Amazon, grade 6, Melee defense = 28

What is the reasoning for including equipment dice in the pool before capping instead of after?

And.. equipment quality dice for weapns only add to the attack dice pool, not to the weapons damage.. correct?

Morrus · Apr 22, 2016

Long post! OK, if I understand your questions:

1) The overall max dice pool applies to both PCs and monsters. It reduces swinginess issues that early playtests had. Note that the Bestiaries aren't actually out yet, so those DEFENSE scores are not yet set in stone -- it is likely that the dice pools which create those scores will end up limiting them in the same way. My main reservation is feedback which is starting to hint that things are getting a little *too* balanced, which is why I've held back on doing that quite yet. I'll have to decide 100% once the Bestiaries come out, but if that happens those NPCs will be slightly higher grades reflecting their higher DEFENSE scores (6d6 and 8d6 respectively).

2) Correct. You exchange the dice for damage if you want more damage.

Knowing how to use high quality climbing gear is a skill. I personally wouldn't have the faintest clue how a carabena (sp?) or a grapple or abseiling equipment worked.

The max dice pool, is a balancing factor. I'm the first to admit that real life isn't balanced, and balancing rules make no sense whatsoever is any attempt at simulation; but on the other side of the coin, this is a game, and while there's a lot of exception-based design in there and a lot of "guidelines not rules" which allow you to make a monster with any stats you want, having those core concepts in there is useful; it means the GM has to think about why he's changing that.

Primitive Screwhead · Apr 23, 2016

For climbing, note that that character has the proper skill level. Since skill cant exceed stat, quality equipment is pointless to characters until they get to be higher grade. And even then a mastercraft or unique item does very little due to the cap.

I think equipment should add to the dice pool after it is cappes

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Morrus · Apr 23, 2016

You can certainly do that as a house rule if you wish! The core rule mechanic isn't changing any time soon though. That max dice pool was the result of two years of playtesting feedback, and is the rule in the actual books.

You're correct in that handing a low grade character expensive gear is largely (deliberately) pointless. And a very optimised character can approach or reach the MDP without needing equipment. They're the freeclimbers and free runners of the world! It's not really intended that players be using massive dice pools, and you'd have to be very high grade to full benefit from legendary gear - well beyond grade 20 or so, probably three times that or more. You'd need a max dice pool in the region of 15d6; only, say, one or two people in the world should be able to really use a given legendary item to its fullest potential.

Incidentally, a brick wall in Future Core is just Difficult [16]. A starting grade 5 character can do that 50% of the time. A tightrope is 25. Where are you getting the 25 for the brick wall from? Is there some errata I need to address somewhere?

[Edit - ah, I've spotted it. Yeah that entry in the example benchmarks table is an error - the tightrope is the 25. The wall difficulties are all on page 30.]

Primitive Screwhead · Apr 24, 2016

Hmm. I will have to try to wrap my head around that paradigm.. it is much flatter and provides a lot less swingyness in a external/artificial sort of way.

Did you get a chance to look at the conversions I posted in the other thread? The defenses tended to be 16 to 21.
The Gibberling in the Haunting adventure has a melee defense of 25.. and is listed as Grade 4.

In my last session the Monk battled some minions for a couple of rounds... and the phrase 'flurry of misses' came up. It didn't help that he was using Psionic armor so when the minions got lucky enough to actually hit him, their daggers couldn't pierce his armor. I couldn't use Deadly Strike to increase damage to bypass the armor because then they would always miss.

Yes, I know playtest is over and the rules are sent to print.. just having problems grokking the math. Its possible the late hour might have something to do with that...

Morrus · Apr 24, 2016

Yeah, it is a heck of a lot flatter than D&D is. As you mentioned, the swinginess reduction is notable; having DEFENSE scores restricted by the max dice pool would increase that effect. Well, the DEFENSE scores wouldn't change, it's just the max dice pool of creatures would sometimes increase if they had high DEFENSes (divide the highest by 3.5 and round down, basically, so a critter with a DEFENSE of 25 would have a MDP of 7d6).

It's worth noting that that would have a *very* flattening effect; it would be veering a little too close to artificial symmetry and forced balance for my personal taste. I can absolutely see the argument for it, though.

What do you mean by psionic armor? What mooks were you using? Did they try flanking, getting higher ground, aiming or feinting, all that stuff? It's OK to sometimes have some weak foes that the PCs can feel heroic as they plow though them; they don't get many XP for an easy encounter like that, but sometimes the good guys just need to mow down a bunch of stormtroopers who can't shoot for toffee, y'know? Just don't use critters like that too much, or the players might get bored.

Taralan · Apr 24, 2016

If the intent is to have masterwork equioment more valable to experience character isin't the curent system doing the reverse ?

This happenned in my startrek-tyoe game yesterday. The normal crew 4d with master sensors. (+1d) could reach 5d, the same as a beginning PC without the equipment who, while more experienced, could not make use of the equipment. And we see that the same will happen across the board since a more experienced character has more chances of already reaching the maximum dice level of its grade without the equipment.

Maybe I am missing something but it seems that therefore better equipment benefit more LESS experienced character and not the reverse, which may be fine but it does not seem to be the intent.

Primitive Screwhead · Apr 24, 2016

Morrus said:
Incidentally, a brick wall in Future Core is just Difficult [16]. A starting grade 5 character can do that 50% of the time. A tightrope is 25. Where are you getting the 25 for the brick wall from? Is there some errata I need to address somewhere?

[Edit - ah, I've spotted it. Yeah that entry in the example benchmarks table is an error - the tightrope is the 25. The wall difficulties are all on page 30.]

Then Fantasy Core, just downloaded, has the same example benchmark table error.

Primitive Screwhead · Apr 24, 2016

Taralan said:
It the intent is to have masterwork equioment more valable to experience character isin't the curent system coing thé reverse ?

I think the system makes masterwork equipment more valuable to an equally skilled character of higher grade.
In order to be the best you can be {max die pool}, you start with a stat pool of 3D and a skill pool of 2D. Then either keep pumping up stat/skill or bump your skill once and get masterwork items.

If I give an archer an excellent bow which grants +2D and he is already rolling 5d due to stat plus skill, he has to gain 5 grades before seeing the full benefit of that bow. So oddly enough, the more valuable equipment are items that the PC just has 1 die of skill and a low stat.
At higher grades the progression of the max dice pool is exponential, so eventually he would need to advance more grades.

If you have the minimum requirements to get the max benefit from a Legendary item, 5d stat, 5d skill.. you would have to be somewhere around grade 70 to use the +5d bonus. {the max die pool chart ends at grade 49 so I am not exact on that}

... which reminds me of another question.
One of my PC's is an Ogre with a STR of 11. If the Psion uses Adrenalize on him and increases his STR over 15, gaining a new die of stat bonus... is that die subject to the max die pool cap?

re; Psionic Armor and the Monk/Mook battle. He was pumping 15 points into Biofeedback each turn gaining SOAK 10.
The Cultists had Pack-Attack, used Feint, flanking, and every trick could think of. The first round looked heroic. The fourth round was just silly. The only damage he received was a lucky Critical that pushed him on the Bleeding track.

Morrus · Apr 24, 2016

Primitive Screwhead said:
re; Psionic Armor and the Monk/Mook battle. He was pumping 15 points into Biofeedback each turn gaining SOAK 10.
The Cultists had Pack-Attack, used Feint, flanking, and every trick could think of. The first round looked heroic. The fourth round was just silly. The only damage he received was a lucky Critical that pushed him on the Bleeding track.

That's fine. He gets an encounter fighting some weak mooks and feels awesome. He can't keep it up forever though - PSI point deplete! It's really OK for that to happen sometimes. As a GM, you can either use more powerful foes, or view the encounter as a resource depletion.

Remember that every 6 does 1 damage anyway. It's impossible to completely SOAK all damage all day.

One thing I think it's important to do in adventure design is make the 15-minugte workday impossible. Those PSI points have to last all day.