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Monte Cook On Fumble Mechanics
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7694529" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>First of all, everything is always up to GM judgment. A GM should never let a ridiculous result stand just because rules. I would like to think that GMs don't need to be especially empowered to do that or to at least reroll ridiculous results.</p><p></p><p>But more to the point, the result you achieved is a result of the naive simplicity and frankly poor design of the old 'Good Hits and Bad Misses' tables in Dragon. While the idea in the article is awesome, and obviously its one of the most influential and well known articles ever published in Dragon, as a first draft implementation it is somewhat lacking. Problems like you describe don't require GM insertion if you design the tables well. For example, a 'Hit Ally' result can be made to not require GM fiat, if it is written with a reasonableness caveat like: "Ignore this result if no ally is adjacent to or interposing the target." Indeed, virtually all fumbles of this sort require a reasonableness clause if you are using them without interpretation. Obviously a result like, "Drop weapon in adjacent space.", probably needs a reasonableness clause like, "Ignore this result if you are using a natural weapon." If it doesn't, you better be prepared for possibly unintended results like self-decapitation in the event of a head butt.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7694529, member: 4937"] First of all, everything is always up to GM judgment. A GM should never let a ridiculous result stand just because rules. I would like to think that GMs don't need to be especially empowered to do that or to at least reroll ridiculous results. But more to the point, the result you achieved is a result of the naive simplicity and frankly poor design of the old 'Good Hits and Bad Misses' tables in Dragon. While the idea in the article is awesome, and obviously its one of the most influential and well known articles ever published in Dragon, as a first draft implementation it is somewhat lacking. Problems like you describe don't require GM insertion if you design the tables well. For example, a 'Hit Ally' result can be made to not require GM fiat, if it is written with a reasonableness caveat like: "Ignore this result if no ally is adjacent to or interposing the target." Indeed, virtually all fumbles of this sort require a reasonableness clause if you are using them without interpretation. Obviously a result like, "Drop weapon in adjacent space.", probably needs a reasonableness clause like, "Ignore this result if you are using a natural weapon." If it doesn't, you better be prepared for possibly unintended results like self-decapitation in the event of a head butt. [/QUOTE]
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