Celebrim
Legend
Guidelines for Handling Stunts
Invariably, particularly during combat, players will propose actions that do not easily or at least obviously correspond to normal combat maneuvers. Usually these players are seeking some sort of advantage they imagine that they can obtain in the situation by doing something specific rather than something more abstract like simply “I attack the orc.” Instead, the player may say something like, “I run toward the melee, jump up on the table, and swing my great axe in an arc at all three orcs!” Within the rules, these unusual and often daring propositions are collectively referred to as ‘stunts’.
On the one hand, this is a very laudable proposition by the player. The player here is doing exactly what he should be doing in a role playing game. He is imagining the environment and seeking to concretely interact with it. He is engaged in the story and taking an active role in the story telling. And he is protagonizing his character in a way that is dramatic and cinematic, and so entertaining to the GM, the other players, and presumably the player himself. Propositions like the above make for far more memorable scenes and are far more likely to be fondly recounted later than several rounds of combat were players just declare they attack and roll a dice.
On the other hand, such propositions have a number of potential pitfalls. First, such propositions create extra work for a GM by forcing them to rule on a situation without clear guidance by the rules. Secondly, there is the problem that if the action is rewarded with success, it’s likely to be repeated again and again as a standard maneuver and what was once creative and memorable will become rote and trite. And thirdly, there is the problem that when a player evades restrictions on what their character can accomplish and does things that aren’t on the character sheet – like getting extra attack actions he isn’t normally qualified for - it invariably shifts spotlight to the player at the expense of the other players in the game. This may lead to situations where each player feels the need to one up the other player just to get his share of the spot light, or feelings that the DM is showing favoritism, or even that the game itself has become ridiculous and unfair since it is no longer bounded by reasonable and knowable restrictions on what a character is allowed to do.
Most GMs try to resolve this problem in one of two ways. Some GMs have been burned sufficiently often by players that they get in the habit of saying “No” to all creative propositions. Either they literally say, “No, you can’t do that, it’s against the rules.”, or they allow the action but treat it just like a normal attack, or they make the player leap through a bunch of difficult hurdles and hoops only to obtain no real advantage that makes the attempt worth it. GMs that adopt this approach end up suppressing their player’s creativity and feeling of self-worth, and may break emersion by having the rules be more important than the player’s sense of verisimilitude. The more creative players at the table may become dissatisfied and simply drift away. Players with the main play motivation of having shining moments of awesome where they garner the accolades of other players may become bored or resort to system mastery, cheating or metagaming to try to obtain the results they want.
On the other hand, some GMs in an effort to not be ‘that GM’ adopt the habit of always saying “Yes” to every creative proposition. While these GMs don’t stifle their player’s desirable creative impulses, their games often take on a gonzo character, with players proposing all sorts of wild ideas with the expectation that the GM will unequivocally validate their requests. The more aggressive and creative players at the table may end up making propositions in the form of demands, with the expectation that the DMs role is only to validate their inevitable success. Rejections of these demands will likely provoke argument and even anger. The GM will often end up introducing rulings that imbalance the game, as characters will in effect have many reliable powers not listed on their character sheet. In the worst case, there is hardly a point in investing in character abilities, as well meaning or pushover DMs allow any ability to be easily duplicated. Players who primarily play the game to challenge themselves and who enjoy solving tactical problems with limited resources may become dissatisfied both with what they see as their own unwanted ability to break the rules, and with other players spotlight stealing behavior. The GM themselves may perhaps be counted in this group, as they find their game increasingly hard to manage from the standpoint of balance and challenge. And perhaps worst of all, the very creativity they intend to encourage, may actually be harmed by saying “Yes” to everything. If “Yes” is the answer to everything, players have no incentive to tailor their propositions to the environment they find their characters in, or to take risks proportional to the reward, or even to vary their requests from situation to situation. What may seem charming and exciting when first tried, becomes tired and grating when attempted for the fifth or tenth time.
Some systems try to steer the GM to a middle way through a mechanical solution. For example, they may suggest that if a player proposes a stunt they receive at the DMs option a static bonus of some sort. Or they may give all players a certain amount of narrative resources that can be spent to buy stunts. In my opinion, neither system works very well. The standardized mechanical approach quickly becomes as rote and unimaginative as just saying “Yes”. The narrative approach stifles the very impulse that causes players to propose stunts, by just making stunts just another game resource to be tactically utilized. Indeed, while these rules allow players to spend Destiny Points in order to engage in actions that could be considered stunts, like using feats or skills that they don’t actually have, a GM should not consider that to be how these rules intend most stunts to be resolved.
Actually ruling on and resolving propositions well is as much an art as a science, and as the number of propositions that a player can make are basically infinite and often unique. No single system or technique can truly cover them all well. Instead, each troubling proposition that a player makes should be considered a sort of wicked problem requiring an equally unique solution. There can therefore be no firm rules regarding stunts - only good guidelines. What these guidelines will attempt to do is arm the GM with a set of tools already present within the rules which can be used in combination to resolve most any situation the GM may be asked to rule on. The truth is, the only good solution to resolving a player’s creative and inventive proposition, is to be equally creative and inventive.
In general, a GM’s goal should be to break down each proposition into components that are already covered by the rules.
#1: Avoid giving something for nothing – At each step in process, make sure that the whole you are arriving at balances some risks with some benefits. The balance need not be even, but there should be some risk that the player understands he is taking, and some tangible benefit the player recognizes he has received when everything works out. It may be that the player gets less benefit than risk, or less risk than benefit, depending on how suitable to the tactical situation his request actually is and how suitable the character’s skills are for fulfilling a player’s vision, but the goal here is for the player to see both sides of the problem and to see that the solution you are offering is as fair as you can manage. When in doubt though, it’s better to err on the side of being generous. There should be at least a chance of success, and in particular some character ought to be able to carry off the stunt even if this particular PC with low dexterity and a sack full of gold on his back might not. Likewise, there should be at least some potential benefit. Keep in mind that just because a particular character can trivially pay a cost, doesn’t make it less of a cost. For example, players with higher level characters may frequently propose a stunt which depends on a skill check that they can trivially pass and indeed cannot fail. You need not impose any higher burden on such characters, as the cost of performing such a stunt was paid during character creation and advancement, and the ability to perform stunts using such skills is the player’s due reward.
#2: Map the request to its nearest analogue in the rules - For example, a typical feature of most stunt propositions is that they are reckless attacks. A simple reasonable interpretation of a stunt may be that the player has just creatively expressed the desire for his character to take the offensive fighting stance, throwing himself into the melee with abandon. Therefore, you can as a DM assume that this has happened and apply to the character’s attack the benefits and penalties thereof. In the case of the example proposition with which we opened this discussion, that is one reasonable interpretation. Likewise, depending on the circumstance, it may be reasonable to rule that the player has simply declared a charge attack in a more colorful manner. Another common example is to declare a stunt which corresponds well to a normal combat maneuver. For example, a player may declare his desire to jump on the back of a monster and begin stabbing it in the neck. This attack, colorful though it may be, is actually little more than initiating a clinch maneuver with the monster in question, and most of the actions that he may attempt during this clinch correspond to things already covered by the rules since it is precisely these sort of situations for which the clinch maneuver was created. The same sort of thing applies to tricks like pulling the carpet out from under a foe, which can and probably should be interpreted as nothing more difficult to adjudicate as a trip combat maneuver with an improvised weapon. As a GM in this situation, you need only interpret the request according to whatever standard maneuver is most favorable to the player’s circumstances and apparent intention.
This approach works well because the standard rules already do not give the player something for nothing. Each choice that a player makes in combat has both benefits and disadvantages. Likewise, the rules already give players opportunity to create characters that are more skillful at certain maneuvers, thereby encouraging more stunts of a particular sort.
#3: Rely on circumstance modifiers: Returning back to the example of the great axe wielding adventurer attacking the orcs, it is clear that the whole intention of the stunt covers more areas than are covered by charging or adopting an offensive fighting stance. Consider the matter of the table. This too is also an area of the game already covered by the rules. Characters attacking from higher ground receive a standard +1 circumstance modifier to hit a target. It remains to resolve only the matter of how the player got up on the table, which is likewise an area covered by the rules – the PC needs to make a jump check. The rules provide for the GM to apply circumstance modifiers to propositions using their best judgment. Sometimes suggested modifiers have been provided for the circumstance, such as the standard +1 modifier for attacking from higher ground. But the option is left open ended precisely with stunts in mind. In general, depending on how appropriate the stunt is to the circumstances and how well thought out the plan, a GM should apply a +1 to +3 modifier to the player’s chance of success. Giving a +1 modifier to hit in exchange for the player engaging with the environment creatively never hurt any campaign. In general, such minor advantages require the investment of only small costs – making oneself an obvious target, or passing a fairly easy skill check.
#4: Set stakes for any additional advantage above and beyond small modifiers: In the example stunt involving the great axe wielding player wanting to attack three orcs, the player proposed that their character would “swing my great axe in an arc at all three orcs”. This action can be mapped to a near mechanical equivalent in the rules – usually feats such as Cleave or Whirlwind Attack. If the character in question already has such feat and using it in the situation would be legal, then all is well and good. If not, consider what the effects of granting the player access to a one time use of a feat would be. It may be helpful to measure just how advantageous granting the player’s request would be by counting the number of rules the player is asking to break:
In the case of Whirlwind Attack, treating the character’s proposition as using a Whirlwind attack in this situation would likely by breaking a fairly large number of rules, as that feat has a very large number of prerequisites and normally requires a full attack action. Cleave on the other hand normally has only two prerequisites, one or more of which a great axe wielding attacker may already qualify for. In most situations, you should prefer to resolve the stunt in such a way that the fewest rules are broken but for higher level characters as they become more skillful you may sometimes prefer to resolve stunts in favor of higher risk and higher reward for dramatic purposes.
If a positive rule breaking advantage is to be earned, there should be a corresponding risk to be accepted in the event that the stunt fails. A negative stake should by created with recourse to the rules and commiserate to the level of benefit that the player is seeking from the positive stake. Examples of negative stakes include:
Once the stakes are decided on, assign a difficulty to the stunt and suggest a skill or ability that will be used to test whether the stunt succeeds or fails. A suggested DC is 10 + 5 per rule that the stunt breaks. This skill or ability should be relevant to the situation and may be suggested by the prerequisites for the stunt the player is attempting. In the case of attempting to Cleave without actually having the feat, you may require a Strength check. In the case of other stunts, a Balance, Sleight of Hand, Tumble, Tactics, Dexterity, Intelligence or even a combat maneuver check or a Reflex save might be appropriate. Ideally, the test you choose should be related to both the task being accomplished and the character’s particular approach to problem solving. However, if the player proposes a stunt that might be easy for a different PC but is really a stretch for the character’s normal skill set, don’t be afraid to ask for a skill that plays against the character’s strengths. If you don’t do that, you risk causing one of the other players to feel they have no role in the party, and no unique way to shine.
#5: Fewer rolls are better than more rolls: Resolving a stunt should ideally take very little time and not disrupt play. If you ever have some doubt as to whether a roll is necessary for establishing the fiction or whether its failure or success adds much to the scene, it’s best to drop it.
The game is already complex as it is. For example, in the case of the first stunt we looked at of jumping up on a table and trying to cleave three orcs, regardless of what we make of the stunt, resolving this action still involves one or more to hit rolls, one or more damage rolls, and potentially one or more threats of a critical hit. We should as much as possible try to simplify whether the stunt succeeds down to one additional roll. The temptation in a stunt will usually be to check every possible failure case at every step. Not only does this mean stunts are very likely to not come off, discouraging players from attempting them, but resolving the stunt will slow down play sufficiently that it will lose some of its excitement.
In the case of jumping up on the table, you’ll need to decide whether the jump is sufficiently heroic to bother testing it in addition to testing whether the character will benefit temporarily as if acting with an additional feat. In most cases the answer should be, “No.” Jumping up on the table isn’t a particularly heroic act and it’s just not worth testing, and the failure case of failing to jump on the table can be incorporated into stakes of testing the stunt. Fortunately, in many cases, the character that attempts this action will have more than sufficient strength and skill to complete such a jump with no chance of failure anyway. And if the chance of failure is particularly small, don’t bother. The only time therefore you should bother testing the jump itself is when it truly risky for a character of a particular level of skill. For example, the player of a character wearing full plate, with a 50lb backpack on his back, and having no ranks in jump should probably think hard before proposing stunts involving jumping nimbly about, as his character is ill-suited for such things and perhaps should adopt a more conservative approach that plays to his strengths.
In general, players of characters with many skill points should be encouraged to try stunts, as the character’s abundant skill and access to skills needs to be considered part of what balances the character against other adventurers with more combat abilities or the ability to perform reality bending and rules breaking magic. Even better, their high degree of skill likely to allow them to automatically succeed at most such endeavored facilitating speedy play. In general, at lower levels, players will find performing heroic stunts somewhat difficult, and as a DM you’ll be justified in leading them through the process at some length. Be sure to reinforce the idea that stunt propositions are welcome, and that while perhaps at low level they are often doubtful, they should expect at higher levels to perform all sorts of crazy acts commiserate with their increasing powers. Once players begin to get a feel for how you will rule, they will tend to tailor their propositions to what they reasonably believe they have a chance of succeeding in based on past propositions and play should typically speed up as both sides of the table gain experience in handling creative play.
In the following sections, I'll examine practical cases and append any house rules I reference in the text.
Invariably, particularly during combat, players will propose actions that do not easily or at least obviously correspond to normal combat maneuvers. Usually these players are seeking some sort of advantage they imagine that they can obtain in the situation by doing something specific rather than something more abstract like simply “I attack the orc.” Instead, the player may say something like, “I run toward the melee, jump up on the table, and swing my great axe in an arc at all three orcs!” Within the rules, these unusual and often daring propositions are collectively referred to as ‘stunts’.
On the one hand, this is a very laudable proposition by the player. The player here is doing exactly what he should be doing in a role playing game. He is imagining the environment and seeking to concretely interact with it. He is engaged in the story and taking an active role in the story telling. And he is protagonizing his character in a way that is dramatic and cinematic, and so entertaining to the GM, the other players, and presumably the player himself. Propositions like the above make for far more memorable scenes and are far more likely to be fondly recounted later than several rounds of combat were players just declare they attack and roll a dice.
On the other hand, such propositions have a number of potential pitfalls. First, such propositions create extra work for a GM by forcing them to rule on a situation without clear guidance by the rules. Secondly, there is the problem that if the action is rewarded with success, it’s likely to be repeated again and again as a standard maneuver and what was once creative and memorable will become rote and trite. And thirdly, there is the problem that when a player evades restrictions on what their character can accomplish and does things that aren’t on the character sheet – like getting extra attack actions he isn’t normally qualified for - it invariably shifts spotlight to the player at the expense of the other players in the game. This may lead to situations where each player feels the need to one up the other player just to get his share of the spot light, or feelings that the DM is showing favoritism, or even that the game itself has become ridiculous and unfair since it is no longer bounded by reasonable and knowable restrictions on what a character is allowed to do.
Most GMs try to resolve this problem in one of two ways. Some GMs have been burned sufficiently often by players that they get in the habit of saying “No” to all creative propositions. Either they literally say, “No, you can’t do that, it’s against the rules.”, or they allow the action but treat it just like a normal attack, or they make the player leap through a bunch of difficult hurdles and hoops only to obtain no real advantage that makes the attempt worth it. GMs that adopt this approach end up suppressing their player’s creativity and feeling of self-worth, and may break emersion by having the rules be more important than the player’s sense of verisimilitude. The more creative players at the table may become dissatisfied and simply drift away. Players with the main play motivation of having shining moments of awesome where they garner the accolades of other players may become bored or resort to system mastery, cheating or metagaming to try to obtain the results they want.
On the other hand, some GMs in an effort to not be ‘that GM’ adopt the habit of always saying “Yes” to every creative proposition. While these GMs don’t stifle their player’s desirable creative impulses, their games often take on a gonzo character, with players proposing all sorts of wild ideas with the expectation that the GM will unequivocally validate their requests. The more aggressive and creative players at the table may end up making propositions in the form of demands, with the expectation that the DMs role is only to validate their inevitable success. Rejections of these demands will likely provoke argument and even anger. The GM will often end up introducing rulings that imbalance the game, as characters will in effect have many reliable powers not listed on their character sheet. In the worst case, there is hardly a point in investing in character abilities, as well meaning or pushover DMs allow any ability to be easily duplicated. Players who primarily play the game to challenge themselves and who enjoy solving tactical problems with limited resources may become dissatisfied both with what they see as their own unwanted ability to break the rules, and with other players spotlight stealing behavior. The GM themselves may perhaps be counted in this group, as they find their game increasingly hard to manage from the standpoint of balance and challenge. And perhaps worst of all, the very creativity they intend to encourage, may actually be harmed by saying “Yes” to everything. If “Yes” is the answer to everything, players have no incentive to tailor their propositions to the environment they find their characters in, or to take risks proportional to the reward, or even to vary their requests from situation to situation. What may seem charming and exciting when first tried, becomes tired and grating when attempted for the fifth or tenth time.
Some systems try to steer the GM to a middle way through a mechanical solution. For example, they may suggest that if a player proposes a stunt they receive at the DMs option a static bonus of some sort. Or they may give all players a certain amount of narrative resources that can be spent to buy stunts. In my opinion, neither system works very well. The standardized mechanical approach quickly becomes as rote and unimaginative as just saying “Yes”. The narrative approach stifles the very impulse that causes players to propose stunts, by just making stunts just another game resource to be tactically utilized. Indeed, while these rules allow players to spend Destiny Points in order to engage in actions that could be considered stunts, like using feats or skills that they don’t actually have, a GM should not consider that to be how these rules intend most stunts to be resolved.
Actually ruling on and resolving propositions well is as much an art as a science, and as the number of propositions that a player can make are basically infinite and often unique. No single system or technique can truly cover them all well. Instead, each troubling proposition that a player makes should be considered a sort of wicked problem requiring an equally unique solution. There can therefore be no firm rules regarding stunts - only good guidelines. What these guidelines will attempt to do is arm the GM with a set of tools already present within the rules which can be used in combination to resolve most any situation the GM may be asked to rule on. The truth is, the only good solution to resolving a player’s creative and inventive proposition, is to be equally creative and inventive.
In general, a GM’s goal should be to break down each proposition into components that are already covered by the rules.
#1: Avoid giving something for nothing – At each step in process, make sure that the whole you are arriving at balances some risks with some benefits. The balance need not be even, but there should be some risk that the player understands he is taking, and some tangible benefit the player recognizes he has received when everything works out. It may be that the player gets less benefit than risk, or less risk than benefit, depending on how suitable to the tactical situation his request actually is and how suitable the character’s skills are for fulfilling a player’s vision, but the goal here is for the player to see both sides of the problem and to see that the solution you are offering is as fair as you can manage. When in doubt though, it’s better to err on the side of being generous. There should be at least a chance of success, and in particular some character ought to be able to carry off the stunt even if this particular PC with low dexterity and a sack full of gold on his back might not. Likewise, there should be at least some potential benefit. Keep in mind that just because a particular character can trivially pay a cost, doesn’t make it less of a cost. For example, players with higher level characters may frequently propose a stunt which depends on a skill check that they can trivially pass and indeed cannot fail. You need not impose any higher burden on such characters, as the cost of performing such a stunt was paid during character creation and advancement, and the ability to perform stunts using such skills is the player’s due reward.
#2: Map the request to its nearest analogue in the rules - For example, a typical feature of most stunt propositions is that they are reckless attacks. A simple reasonable interpretation of a stunt may be that the player has just creatively expressed the desire for his character to take the offensive fighting stance, throwing himself into the melee with abandon. Therefore, you can as a DM assume that this has happened and apply to the character’s attack the benefits and penalties thereof. In the case of the example proposition with which we opened this discussion, that is one reasonable interpretation. Likewise, depending on the circumstance, it may be reasonable to rule that the player has simply declared a charge attack in a more colorful manner. Another common example is to declare a stunt which corresponds well to a normal combat maneuver. For example, a player may declare his desire to jump on the back of a monster and begin stabbing it in the neck. This attack, colorful though it may be, is actually little more than initiating a clinch maneuver with the monster in question, and most of the actions that he may attempt during this clinch correspond to things already covered by the rules since it is precisely these sort of situations for which the clinch maneuver was created. The same sort of thing applies to tricks like pulling the carpet out from under a foe, which can and probably should be interpreted as nothing more difficult to adjudicate as a trip combat maneuver with an improvised weapon. As a GM in this situation, you need only interpret the request according to whatever standard maneuver is most favorable to the player’s circumstances and apparent intention.
This approach works well because the standard rules already do not give the player something for nothing. Each choice that a player makes in combat has both benefits and disadvantages. Likewise, the rules already give players opportunity to create characters that are more skillful at certain maneuvers, thereby encouraging more stunts of a particular sort.
#3: Rely on circumstance modifiers: Returning back to the example of the great axe wielding adventurer attacking the orcs, it is clear that the whole intention of the stunt covers more areas than are covered by charging or adopting an offensive fighting stance. Consider the matter of the table. This too is also an area of the game already covered by the rules. Characters attacking from higher ground receive a standard +1 circumstance modifier to hit a target. It remains to resolve only the matter of how the player got up on the table, which is likewise an area covered by the rules – the PC needs to make a jump check. The rules provide for the GM to apply circumstance modifiers to propositions using their best judgment. Sometimes suggested modifiers have been provided for the circumstance, such as the standard +1 modifier for attacking from higher ground. But the option is left open ended precisely with stunts in mind. In general, depending on how appropriate the stunt is to the circumstances and how well thought out the plan, a GM should apply a +1 to +3 modifier to the player’s chance of success. Giving a +1 modifier to hit in exchange for the player engaging with the environment creatively never hurt any campaign. In general, such minor advantages require the investment of only small costs – making oneself an obvious target, or passing a fairly easy skill check.
#4: Set stakes for any additional advantage above and beyond small modifiers: In the example stunt involving the great axe wielding player wanting to attack three orcs, the player proposed that their character would “swing my great axe in an arc at all three orcs”. This action can be mapped to a near mechanical equivalent in the rules – usually feats such as Cleave or Whirlwind Attack. If the character in question already has such feat and using it in the situation would be legal, then all is well and good. If not, consider what the effects of granting the player access to a one time use of a feat would be. It may be helpful to measure just how advantageous granting the player’s request would be by counting the number of rules the player is asking to break:
- How many prerequisites for a particular feat is a player missing? Count each as breaking one rule.
- Do the prerequisites for the feat involve trained only skills, class skills, or class related abilities for a class that the player does not have? If so, count this as breaking an additional rule.
- If the player had the feat, would it be legal to use in the current situation? Count each way using the feat or ability would not normally be legal as one breaking of the rules.
In the case of Whirlwind Attack, treating the character’s proposition as using a Whirlwind attack in this situation would likely by breaking a fairly large number of rules, as that feat has a very large number of prerequisites and normally requires a full attack action. Cleave on the other hand normally has only two prerequisites, one or more of which a great axe wielding attacker may already qualify for. In most situations, you should prefer to resolve the stunt in such a way that the fewest rules are broken but for higher level characters as they become more skillful you may sometimes prefer to resolve stunts in favor of higher risk and higher reward for dramatic purposes.
If a positive rule breaking advantage is to be earned, there should be a corresponding risk to be accepted in the event that the stunt fails. A negative stake should by created with recourse to the rules and commiserate to the level of benefit that the player is seeking from the positive stake. Examples of negative stakes include:
- The stunt simply fails, causing the PC’s action to be wasted.
- The character not only misses but automatically threatens a fumble.
- The action not only fails, but the character draws an attack of opportunity.
- The character automatically suffers a fumble or suffers a fumble of a type selected by the DM as appropriate to the situation.
- In the case of a stunt that depends on a jump, climb, balance or similar check, the character suffers the consequences of failing a skill check of that sort.
Once the stakes are decided on, assign a difficulty to the stunt and suggest a skill or ability that will be used to test whether the stunt succeeds or fails. A suggested DC is 10 + 5 per rule that the stunt breaks. This skill or ability should be relevant to the situation and may be suggested by the prerequisites for the stunt the player is attempting. In the case of attempting to Cleave without actually having the feat, you may require a Strength check. In the case of other stunts, a Balance, Sleight of Hand, Tumble, Tactics, Dexterity, Intelligence or even a combat maneuver check or a Reflex save might be appropriate. Ideally, the test you choose should be related to both the task being accomplished and the character’s particular approach to problem solving. However, if the player proposes a stunt that might be easy for a different PC but is really a stretch for the character’s normal skill set, don’t be afraid to ask for a skill that plays against the character’s strengths. If you don’t do that, you risk causing one of the other players to feel they have no role in the party, and no unique way to shine.
#5: Fewer rolls are better than more rolls: Resolving a stunt should ideally take very little time and not disrupt play. If you ever have some doubt as to whether a roll is necessary for establishing the fiction or whether its failure or success adds much to the scene, it’s best to drop it.
The game is already complex as it is. For example, in the case of the first stunt we looked at of jumping up on a table and trying to cleave three orcs, regardless of what we make of the stunt, resolving this action still involves one or more to hit rolls, one or more damage rolls, and potentially one or more threats of a critical hit. We should as much as possible try to simplify whether the stunt succeeds down to one additional roll. The temptation in a stunt will usually be to check every possible failure case at every step. Not only does this mean stunts are very likely to not come off, discouraging players from attempting them, but resolving the stunt will slow down play sufficiently that it will lose some of its excitement.
In the case of jumping up on the table, you’ll need to decide whether the jump is sufficiently heroic to bother testing it in addition to testing whether the character will benefit temporarily as if acting with an additional feat. In most cases the answer should be, “No.” Jumping up on the table isn’t a particularly heroic act and it’s just not worth testing, and the failure case of failing to jump on the table can be incorporated into stakes of testing the stunt. Fortunately, in many cases, the character that attempts this action will have more than sufficient strength and skill to complete such a jump with no chance of failure anyway. And if the chance of failure is particularly small, don’t bother. The only time therefore you should bother testing the jump itself is when it truly risky for a character of a particular level of skill. For example, the player of a character wearing full plate, with a 50lb backpack on his back, and having no ranks in jump should probably think hard before proposing stunts involving jumping nimbly about, as his character is ill-suited for such things and perhaps should adopt a more conservative approach that plays to his strengths.
In general, players of characters with many skill points should be encouraged to try stunts, as the character’s abundant skill and access to skills needs to be considered part of what balances the character against other adventurers with more combat abilities or the ability to perform reality bending and rules breaking magic. Even better, their high degree of skill likely to allow them to automatically succeed at most such endeavored facilitating speedy play. In general, at lower levels, players will find performing heroic stunts somewhat difficult, and as a DM you’ll be justified in leading them through the process at some length. Be sure to reinforce the idea that stunt propositions are welcome, and that while perhaps at low level they are often doubtful, they should expect at higher levels to perform all sorts of crazy acts commiserate with their increasing powers. Once players begin to get a feel for how you will rule, they will tend to tailor their propositions to what they reasonably believe they have a chance of succeeding in based on past propositions and play should typically speed up as both sides of the table gain experience in handling creative play.
In the following sections, I'll examine practical cases and append any house rules I reference in the text.
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