D&D General Never Hide The Adventure Behind a Skill Check

[Umbran]

On the other hand, do they need to solve the mystery, does the party need to always succeed? I would say no; that failure can be just as interesting as success as long as the PCs have other goals.

So, there's a difference between "not succeed" and "stop the adventure". The latter is less about success, and more about the players still having a good time playing a game that evening.

Say, the group decides to try to recover the Eye of Argon, which they learn was buried in a tomb with Gorgorath the Malignant, some 300 years ago. They dutifully seek out the tomb, and a half hour into exploring it, they completely fail to find the one secret door that will eventually lead them to the tomb with the eye.

They have failed.

But also, in the real world, the players are now stuck sitting at a table with no clear idea of what else to do. The GM prepped this tomb, and doesn't have anything else ready to play this moment. The players can break out a deck of cards and play pinochle, I supposed, but the RPG for the evening is done.

The full form of "fail forward" is not just "have a success with consequence" - that's only one implementation. It is that failure doesn't stop you dead in your tracks with nothing else you can do.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Yes you can but you need use the "Fail Forward" technique. The character succeeds (even if the roll failed) but with unintended consequences. The consequence is usually dictated by the amount by which the character failed.

Just a note, but this isn't fail forward, but success with complication. Fail forward is when you fail, with consequence, but another path opens.

 

[Oofta]

So, there's a difference between "not succeed" and "stop the adventure". The latter is less about success, and more about the players still having a good time playing a game that evening.

Say, the group decides to try to recover the Eye of Argon, which they learn was buried in a tomb with Gorgorath the Malignant, some 300 years ago. They dutifully seek out the tomb, and a half hour into exploring it, they completely fail to find the one secret door that will eventually lead them to the tomb with the eye.

They have failed.

But also, in the real world, the players are now stuck sitting at a table with no clear idea of what else to do. The GM prepped this tomb, and doesn't have anything else ready to play this moment. The players can break out a deck of cards and play pinochle, I supposed, but the RPG for the evening is done.

The full form of "fail forward" is not just "have a success with consequence" - that's only one implementation. It is that failure doesn't stop you dead in your tracks with nothing else you can do.

That's why I don't rely on preplanned dungeons crawls and am always willing to run a session that's largely improv. I identify factions, important motivations of those factions and sketch out some basics of who's who. I also have a list of appropriate random names. I regularly sketch out an extra encounter or two and may make cosmetic changes to encounters to make them fit a new story arc. Some of my most memorable games have been ones that went totally off the rails.

But to address your specific: the hidden door would not be the only way into the tomb, just the best way. If they have to find the secret door, an informant will have told them exactly where to look for it. If there is a chance to miss the secret door then there will be another way in, it will just be more dangerous (even if I have to improvise some traps and encounters). That, to me is failing forward.

But it's also interesting if they fail to find the Eye of Argon. What does it mean to the overall campaign? Does it mean they now have no way of defending their home base and must scramble to evacuate everyone before it's too late? Are they being pursued by the monsters that you had set up as guardians? Can they set up a diversion to slow down the oncoming horde the Eye was supposed to stop? Do we pivot from a dungeon crawl to a race against time? Do they have enough pull to convince the leaders of impending doom, or do they need to risk themselves to find evidence? Even if the DM isn't ready to do that, there's always the PCs being trapped somehow and instead of fighting to get to the Eye they are now fighting to escape. That option does require cosmetic changes but it can sometimes be done by simply changing a bit of set dressing and tone.

I understand that some DMs won't be comfortable with that kind of pivot. If that's the case then bey all means use the fall forward with success at some sort of cost or don't put that kind of obstacle in the way. I'm just firmly in the camp that there will never be a guarantee of success any more than an antagonist is guaranteed to escape.

Side note: pivots are generally easier for me when playing in person because then I don't have to have pre-planned maps.

 

[OB1]

Yep, and to take it one step further, I think dice should only ever be used when you want chance to decide between two interesting outcomes that can change what happens next. Combat is the obvious example, since every success and failure can change what the next character in initiative decides to do. In Exploration, it could be finding a hidden path, a hidden treasure, or even a hidden civilization. In Social, it could be gaining an unexpected ally, making an unexpected enemy or discovering a new perspective on the plot.

 

[jasper]

In a living world. Extra Extra Scooby Gang solves murder mystery which defeated the Reyanad Detective agency. Or extra extra Mad Jasper finds Gorgorath the Malignant Tomb.
Louis Lane. "How did you find it."
Mad jasper, " four weeks ago an adventure party gave me a map to the first level. I just took a pick axe and bash every five feet. Took me three weeks.
Failing forward is a good GAME idea. But you need to balance it out.


four weeks later. Extra Extra Green covered wagon discovered in local moat with five bodies and a dog body in it.

 

[Marc_C]

In a living world. Extra Extra Scooby Gang solves murder mystery which defeated the Reyanad Detective agency. Or extra extra Mad Jasper finds Gorgorath the Malignant Tomb.
Louis Lane. "How did you find it."
Mad jasper, " four weeks ago an adventure party gave me a map to the first level. I just took a pick axe and bash every five feet. Took me three weeks.
Failing forward is a good GAME idea. But you need to balance it out.


four weeks later. Extra Extra Green covered wagon discovered in local moat with five bodies and a dog body in it.

That is called trial and error... attempted by inexperience players who's character die horribly because they attract every single creature in the dungeon.