Martial Practice : Blood Demand

[Garthanos]

Well, I have levels of success/failure, a check that falls more than 4 points on either side of the DC is either a critical failure (low) or a complete success (high). You can buy a Complete Success for the price of a vitality point, if you are invoking a technique in the challenge (IE a ritual or practice or something similar).

DnD has more of an on off heritage with die rolls except for hit points themselves which then have an on off effectiveness

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

DnD has more of an on off heritage with die rolls except for hit points themselves which then have an on off effectiveness

I assume you mean "D&D has a heritage of attack rolls being binary hit/miss only", which is of course very true. OTOH there's plenty of precedent for other things. DW has its 7-9 = partial success, 10+ = complete success (2-6 may or may not represent outright failure depending on the move and the situation). Actually DW doesn't have a SPECIFIC rule, each move IS a rule defining its own success/fail criteria/levels/whatever, though by convention the above is seldom diverged from much. I think there may be a few 'advanced' moves where there is a sort of 'critical failure' threshold.

In any case, 4e itself is pretty 'soft' when it comes to any type of check besides an attack roll. Most skill checks have some level of gradation in their effects (classically things like Athletics and jumping of course, but many rituals fall into the "if you got a 27 it does X, a 32 it does Y" category, Phantom Steeds being the classic example).

I just extended this concept to attacks. One of the consequences being that you can put a bit heftier effects on things, and then reserve them for the best level of success. Get a regular success, you do damage, get a complete success, then you really rang your opponent's bell (or whatever). Granted, its a bit swingy, but less so than if you must hit to do ANYTHING. You can of course still have miss effects, and even 'half damage on a miss, but nothing on a total miss' sorts of things. Obviously you can also have lesser effects on any of these if you desire. It provides the power author a bit more flex in terms of what they can put on the table. I guess you could create the same rule effectively in 4e by exception (IE in the description of a power's effects) but it would a little cumbersome.

 

[Garthanos]

I just extended this concept to attacks. One of the consequences being that you can put a bit heftier effects on things, and then reserve them for the best level of success. Get a regular success, you do damage, get a complete success, then you really rang your opponent's bell (or whatever). Granted, its a bit swingy, but less so than if you must hit to do ANYTHING. You can of course still have miss effects, and even 'half damage on a miss, but nothing on a total miss' sorts of things. Obviously you can also have lesser effects on any of these if you desire. It provides the power author a bit more flex in terms of what they can put on the table. I guess you could create the same rule effectively in 4e by exception (IE in the description of a power's effects) but it would a little cumbersome.

I suppose D&D has always had some form of damage on a miss and a topper in version 3 critical hits came into the picture. And 4e could have 1 effect on a miss another on a hit and another extra effect on a crit (at least I believe items and feats gave it) that's pretty darn varied anyway. Directly in 4e. Standardizing a little more might be a description of what you did.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I suppose D&D has always had some form of damage on a miss and a topper in version 3 critical hits came into the picture. And 4e could have 1 effect on a miss another on a hit and another extra effect on a crit (at least I believe items and feats gave it) that's pretty darn varied anyway. Directly in 4e. Standardizing a little more might be a description of what you did.

Yeah, its all there in a sense in 4e. A lot of stuff is kind of LATENT in 4e. It fits, and the system conceptually makes it fairly straightforward to implement, in a sense, but it was never really explored. Truthfully this is why I'm still kind of pissed off a Mike Mearls...

 

[Garthanos]

Yeah, its all there in a sense in 4e. A lot of stuff is kind of LATENT in 4e. It fits, and the system conceptually makes it fairly straightforward to implement, in a sense, but it was never really explored. Truthfully this is why I'm still kind of pissed off a Mike Mearls...

You and me both brother. There was a path forward