Are Dice Pools Good, Actually?

[Bedrockgames]

Sure they do. I mean, there aren't TNs in real life, but there's a constant evaluation of risk versus capability. It's fundamental to existence. Not having a way to gauge risk in games is bad. Your example of 3d10 being pretty good is exactly what's being discussed -- this knowledge isn't helpful at all if you don't know the level of the challenge. If it's a really hard challenge, but you don't know it, then your faith in 3d10 will lead you to make a choice that's not desirable. TNs aren't magic, they're how you, as GM, can communicate difficulty to the player based on what their PC's perceive.

Now, I prefer less number centric descriptions, so when I run 5e, for instance, I'll say things like, "It looks like an easy climb," or, "that sounds like a really hard thing to do, are you sure?" My players know that easy is 10 (or nearabouts) and really hard is a 25 because I uses the easy/moderate/hard/very hard/near impossible scale for 10/15/20/25/30.

But our understanding of the actual risks when we do things is no where near the precision of knowing the probabilities. Nor is it as precise as the difficulty descriptions in 5E. It is a very general, vague, and often inaccurate sense. If you try to punch me in real life, you have very little idea of your chances of successfully hitting me. You just have vague general sense and a general confidence level. Humans are not computers.

That said, players do need a clear understanding of what they are up against. They don't need the odds, but they need a visible picture of the challenge (there is a big difference between a 5 foot chasm and a 40 foot chasm).

But even in a dice pool system, part of the GM's job, if the game uses TNs, is assigning ones that make sense. That isn't terribly difficult to do. Even if the GM doesn't know the actual probabilities, they learn through experience what is difficult and what isn't. The challenge being faced, and the TN for it should match. But it doesn't need to be tailored to the PCs skill level. If they have a good dice pool, and are skilled at the task, they will have an easier time succeeding. If they have a bad one, and a not very skilled, they will have a harder time succeeding.

Personally I don't want players thinking in terms of numbers. In your example, they are still doing that because, as you point out, they equate the different difficulty levels, with a number. What I would rather give them is as good a description I can of whatever it is they are facing. I view the difficulty descriptions as guidelines for the GM, in setting the difficulty, not as guidelines for the players in determining whether they try something.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I guess it comes down to preference here. At least half of my players tend to dislike systems where they don't have one (it's less of a problem for the people who lean towards the narrative side).

It is definitely a matter of preference. If players want a clearer sense of the probability, that is fine. There is nothing wrong with different preferences. But also I think people sometimes get closed minded about mechanics. Like I said, I just like the muddiness and see it as a feature rather than a bug. There is nothing objectively better about dice pools, just like there is nothing objectively better than 1d20+modifier. They serve different functions. Ideally though I think people should be more open minded about different game mechanics. I play a lot of different games, and grew up playing lots of different games. D&D was always the go to for most people (it was just easy to get a session of D&D going), but we would frequently play games like West End's Star Wars, TORG, GURPS, VAMPIRE, etc). I never found shifting from one system to another particularly jarring. While I might find specific uses of dice not well thought out in a given game, I never understood being against a type of resolution system. You can take any type of dice system and find things to complain about on a forum. But my experience is generally that forum complaints don't match what I see as much at the table.

Regarding narrative play, I don't think it has all that much to do with that. There may be some styles where the muddiness would get in the way. But I am not particularly narrative in my approach, have more of a sandbox style. But I do lean on theater of the mind, rather than use things like miniatures.

 

[Leatherhead]

Bell curves are boring. They force people to take the "safe" options.

 

[schneeland]

@Bedrockgames :
Not contradicting you on being open to other resolution systems, but

1. the same people didn't have any issue with d100 (Rolemaster/HARP) or 2d6 (PbtA) - so I feel it's somehow related to being able to assess easily how well you do on average
2. I feel there has been shift to dice pools with fixed target numbers (cWod -> nWoD/CoD, Shadowrun 4+, Year Zero, I think also FFG Star Wars and Genesys)

 

[Bedrockgames]

@Bedrockgames :

1. I feel there has been shift to dice pools with fixed target numbers (cWod -> nWoD/CoD, Shadowrun 4+, Year Zero, I think also FFG Star Wars and Genesys)

Some games do. And that is fine. However it doesn't mean it is the right approach for me (or the best approach in general). I prefer being able to shift the TN in a dice pool. My biggest issues with Dice Pools, is things like the buckets of dice problem that can arise, or the dice themselves getting bogged down in things like counting and canceling successes (so I avoid both of those in my own games). And I like to do a soft cap of 6d10 (and a hard cap of 10d10 for exceptional cases; and prefer to do take the single highest roll and compare to TN). But even then, I am sure there are people who like throwing handfuls of dice and the latter as well. I prioritize fast resolution though, because I don't like things like combat taking too long. Others won't prioritize that. I will happily play a game that does these things, however, if it is an otherwise enjoyable game and setting.

 

[Bedrockgames]

@Bedrockgames :
Not contradicting you on being open to other resolution systems, but

1. the same people didn't have any issue with d100 (Rolemaster/HARP) or 2d6 (PbtA) - so I feel it's somehow related to being able to assess easily how well you do on average

I don't doubt peoples' preferences are grounded in something real. I am just pointing out those preferences are not universal (I don't really value being able to pin a probability on a given roll---especially on the player end). That said I do like the d100 system. I am also saying, I think on forums people tend to take a very hard line about these sorts of preferences that you just don't see as much at regular tables (and I personally wouldn't want to take such a hard line that I missed out on different types of RPG experiences). It used to be quite common to try out different systems all the time. I have this sense (and it could be wrong) that that changed during the d20 boom. Things are not as homogenous as they were during the boom, but there still does seem to be a lingering hesitancy to play different types of systems freely.

 

[3catcircus]

I prefer a dice pool approach. D20 roll below target number (TN being the attribute that controls the skill you are using). Sufficient skill ranks allow you to roll additional dice in your pool. The amount you roll below (or above) is your margin of success or failure. Each additional success adds 2 points to your margin of success. For combat skills, weapon damage is a fixed amount, modified by your margin of success.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I’m not sure I buy the idea that “count successes” is simpler than “count numbers”, unless the game always has the same numbers be success (eg, success is 5 or 6)

I can't stand variable success numbers in a dice pool - there aren't many people good enough to work out those probabilities in their head.

and honestly I just can’t like a system where I fail a task because I only succeeded twice, and needed to do 3 times. And yes, that still bugs me even a dozen sessions into a campaign in such a system.

Some successes should always do something noticeable.

so, what’s up with dice pools? Why is the bell curve not worth the trivial additional math? Is there something else about it that I’m missing?

First dice pools always have something approximating a bell curve - it's a binomial distribution and then we start tangling with the central limit theorem so we're getting close to a bell curve and get closer the more dice we add. That's an advantage of dice pools.

In addition handfuls of dice are fun to roll - and very fast to evaluate compared to either multiple modifiers and additions or double digit addition. You only need to cancel (which is an advantage shared by Fate despite 4dF not being meaningfully different from 2d6 in other ways (technically it's 4d3-8)).

There's also the fact that, especially with dice pools with multiple sizes of dice it feels a lot better to throw a bonus dice into the dice pool which might or might not do anything to represent an advantage than it does to give them a modifier which will automatically be more math and will always lead to a higher result.

That said, the only dice pools I genuinely like are those used in Cortex Plus, or Fantasy Flight's Star Wars or WFRP3e (or arguably Blades in the Dark) which use the dice pool to separate how successful someone is from whether there are also unwanted consequences.

 

[pemerton]

Some successes should always do something noticeable.

I would say that if you're rolling the dice there should probably be something meaningful at stake. But I don't think the actual number of successes rolled needs to be relevant beyond success or failure. Anymore than it normally matters, in D&D, whether you missed your target number by 3 or by 7.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I would say that if you're rolling the dice there should probably be something meaningful at stake. But I don't think the actual number of successes rolled needs to be relevant beyond success or failure. Anymore than it normally matters, in D&D, whether you missed your target number by 3 or by 7.

I have a general principle I live by as a GM, which is: characters don't need to roll to make coffee, unless they are being shot at or brewing a cup for royalty.