hawkeyefan
Legend
Edit- double post
GM fiat - an illustration
- Thread starter pemerton
- Start date
Risk int roll?
If you’re asking how they determined what/if there was a trap - I telegraphed trouble before it strikes (the well sealed room, circle on the floor, faraday cage like strips in the wall when they melted through). Their quick gather intel gave them a better Position (simply stepping through the circle would've probably have led to a Desperate or even straight up Initiate Action With an NPC with the ghost manifesting). The goal of this conflict was to Get Into the Safe; the Threats were 1) an angry ghost manifesting and 2) the alarm to teh local bluecoat patrol house.
Crimson Longinus
Legend
It should have been "Was there a risk in the roll."
So I am asking did the players roll some roll in the situation to discern the presence and/or nature of the trap, and if they did, what would have happened had they rolled badly? You said they gathered intel, so that's the roll I'm curious about.
As I've said many times, and the book does as well, Gather Intel is generally assumed to be a Fortune Roll. In this case, they were considering the Arcane Stuff (the Whisper has a specific question on their playbook about this), and the Leech glanced over the mechanisms to see if there were further traps (roughly equivalent to Know Things/Spout Lore from DW games without a 6- possibility; and Read a Sitch/Discern Realities and same). That just sets the fictional position for how prepared they were for the actual Threats.
Again, I'm running the Threat Roll construct from Deep Cuts which is very similar to but slightly different then the Action Roll (best practices for the action roll are pretty darn the same but people kept getting the intent wrong so Harper has been trying to work out how to nudge it right, while also focusing on what he likes to spotlight in play). In that they say "I want to do X in the fiction" and I tell them "sure, you'll get Y effect, but X (& maybe Z) are there as Threats. What do you do?" and they say "Oh ok, I'll handle this by doing A" and I say "cool, sounds like Action?"
hawkeyefan
Legend
@Crimson Longinus - offering a slightly different take than @zakael19 based on the standard book rather than the alternate rules in Deeper Cuts.
As zakael says above, Gather Information rolls are generally made without setting Position and Effect. They are instead considered Fortune rolls. So perhaps the player would make a Survey roll to determine if there was a trap, but it would be a Fortune roll rather than a standard Action roll. A Fortune roll means that the result just dictates the quality of the information you get, with 1-3 being minimal information, 4-5 being decent information, and 6 being significant information.
The tiers of success line up with Effect, but a Fortune roll is risk and consequence free.
Depending on the circumstances, though, the GM might decide that an Action roll makes more sense, and then there would be Position and Effect set. For instance, if there was some kind of pressure on the character when the roll is made (think something like Gathering Info in the trash compactor in Star Wars, for example), or similar.
As zakael says above, Gather Information rolls are generally made without setting Position and Effect. They are instead considered Fortune rolls. So perhaps the player would make a Survey roll to determine if there was a trap, but it would be a Fortune roll rather than a standard Action roll. A Fortune roll means that the result just dictates the quality of the information you get, with 1-3 being minimal information, 4-5 being decent information, and 6 being significant information.
The tiers of success line up with Effect, but a Fortune roll is risk and consequence free.
Depending on the circumstances, though, the GM might decide that an Action roll makes more sense, and then there would be Position and Effect set. For instance, if there was some kind of pressure on the character when the roll is made (think something like Gathering Info in the trash compactor in Star Wars, for example), or similar.
Right. If there's an obstacle (or Threat), you're in Action Roll territory. Your goal is information to take some next step, but it's chancy. I tend to keep things in Fortune Roll territory (since Im telegraphing & following through with Threats) as a way to shape the score-world, and only in cases where the information isn't obvious.
A bunch of this stuff around Gather Info for score setup purposes is also covered under the GM Move Provide Opportunities, Follow Their Lead which @Manbearcat alluded to regarding how to generate scores a while back. The latter and below guidance is how I do my score/mission creation with my groups:
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
In thinking about this exchange I expect we probably aren't entirely on the same page with what we consider significant, or at least the scope of things being tracked. Most games will spin out 100s or 1000s of facts, certainly, especially if it is a longer form campaign. I'm just thinking of things that are in motion, and are likely to impact the situation on their own. Like BitD clocks will keep ticking and something will manifest at the end, and maybe even at certain ticks. Beyond that, yes, there may also be situational kind of stuff where some character goes and visits a location and it is determined that something there changed, it is perhaps linked to other things that happened onscreen, etc
I'll be honest, while I have a pretty good ability to keep stuff in mind, over time I've come to find that, in RPGs, KISS is a golden rule! Obscure stuff, loads of extra detail, etc. generally is low payoff for the cost of tracking minutia. It's good to keep some details in mind, and refer back to stuff sometimes, or bring an old situation back in a new state to provide the feeling of continuity and reward players with fun reminders and whatnot of past play. I just don't find a lot of it to be very plot relevant.
robertsconley
Adventurer
We don't need to be on the same page regarding what counts as significant. Significance is a subjective judgment rooted in the focus of the campaign. What I consider significant when running the Majestic Fantasy Realms isn't going to be the same as what Kelsey Dionne considers significant in Western Reaches or what Gavin Norman considers in Dolmenwood.
However, regardless of what is deemed significant, when a referee opts to use World in Motion as a technique, the number of meaningful elements can multiply quickly. That poses a challenge, not because the GM is tracking all of it simultaneously, but because it demands strong organization and memory to respond when any of it becomes relevant.
I think we agree more than not. My campaigns are not driven by a narrative plot. They begin with players choosing a location and character concept, such as serving in the city guard or living in a border village. We discuss their immediate goals, and I prepare by reviewing what has happened in that location. Then I build out a set of NPCs in their social circle, each with their own motivations. From that, I generate an initial timeline based on how those agendas might intersect.
I use a few tools for background activity. Mostly these are random tables tailored to reflect daily life. I also include rare setting-level events, like disasters or supernatural occurrences, determined by calendars or random rolls. These are infrequent and not tied to player actions.
The core principle is simple: only track what affects how characters are roleplayed, whether PC or NPC. If it does not influence how a character is roleplayed, it does not need to be tracked. This keeps things focused and avoids minutiae.
Once play begins, players act freely. Some take initiative while others react to the world. Either way, consequences emerge. Those consequences change how NPCs behave, which leads to new choices. This is how the campaign unfolds when using World in Motion.
At most, I actively track two dozen NPCs, those in the players' immediate sphere. Everything else remains dormant until needed. If the players visit a place or speak to someone unexpectedly, I check my notes and update as needed. The important part is finding what matters quickly, not keeping it all in mind at once.
In World in Motion, the only things I track are characters. Places are described, not monitored. If something changes a location, I update the description. A ruined tower is just a note until a player goes there or an NPC takes interest.
I hope that clarifies it. This is not about tracking thousands of things constantly. It is about creating a world that reacts logically when touched.
hawkeyefan
Legend
Yeah, Gather Info moves can do a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to the structure of a Score. The way that players phrase the question, or the detail they focus on can matter quite a bit.
I think that’s the element that really highlights the difference, and I thibk it’s one that’s often overlooked and may be a bit difficult to recognize at first… how player centric the process is. In Blades, a GM isn’t (generally) creating some kind of scenario or location ahead of play… he’s creating the Score during play, in response to what the players do and ask, and how any related rolls go.
The players choose the target of the Score, they choose the Approach for the Score, they choose the Detail of the Approach, and then they use Gather Information moves to build out from what’s been established. These are the ingredients from which the GM will make the dish.
Bedrockgames
I post in the voice of Christopher Walken
This is one of the reasons I started making Grudge Tables. Past grievances with NPCs can fall by the wayside or get lost in your notes. So having a table that I roll regularly helps keep this stuff in play.
Also keep in mind what Rob and I are talking about is abroad spectrum. Some people lean very heavy on detailing minutiae, some people lean more heavily into just stuff going on around the PCs. And there is a spectrum too on how realistic versus how genre heavy this stuff is. Rob and I do a lot of things very similarly but we also do things very differently too
