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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 9676569" data-attributes="member: 29398">The poster to whom I was replying specifically said (paraphrased from memory) if there's no consequences for failure, just give them the success rather than roll for it.And yet sometimes the true consequence of failure is simply that you didn't succeed - it's the success that has consequences, and you didn't achieve it.  You didn't find the main treasure hoard.  You didn't find the hidden slave pens.  You didn't climb the cliff and now have to go 40 miles out of your way to get to the top.They jumped through those hoops in the hopes that something would happen.  It wasn't guaranteed.If you're inhabiting your character as its player then the two types of frustration - in-fiction and at-table - should align very closely, thus making it difficult-to-impossible to have one without the other.1 - in all cases here I'm assuming the task or intent in question is something where neither success nor failure is guaranteed.2 - whether or not something matters often isn't evident until well after the fact; in the moment, we have to assume it all matters3 - degree of success is tangential; for me the roll can inform degree of success in some situations, while others are pretty much a binary pass-fail.And if the fiction is set up that way with layers of defenses, alarms, etc., that's great.Problem is, it's not always set up that way.  Sometimes the only consequence of failing to disarm a trap is "nothing happens" other than the trap remains in place as a potential threat.Let's take a trapped lock as an example, DC 12.  There's a perhaps-simplified range of possible outcomes on an attempt to disarm the trap:1 - trap disarmed no problem (14-20)2 - trap disarmed but doing so made the lock unusable (success with complication e.g. the acid that was supposed to melt the thief's fingers melted the lock instead) (12-13)3 - trap not disarmed but is still there as a threat (i.e. nothing happens) (5-11)4 - trap is set off (thus requiring possible resource/spell use to fix the consequences) (1-4)A true-binary roll here would only have 1 and 3 as possible outcomes, or maybe 1 and 4.  The way I'd rather do it, though, includes the whole range of outcomes and gets there by only one roll (plus maybe a saving throw if needed on the '4' outcome).Note however that the fail-success break point remains at 11-12 - success with complication still needs that root 'success' roll in order to occur.</blockquote>

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