Strong Fighter, Wimpy Mage

[prosfilaes]

Who says that a Tug of War is over an extended period of time? In the Baby vs. the Troll case, the Troll should be able to yank the Baby over with a single pull, every single time. Less than one round. One roll.

I think focusing on this case is unrealistic. For one, I think Strength may be an exception, that it just has larger range than other stats and skills that develops odd cases like this from the compression onto the same scale. Secondly, most systems develop breaks at extremes, but the work needed to fix that isn't important unless the extremes are important. I've never needed to worry about babies versus trolls, and would feel fine just handwaving it. I don't think it entirely unrealistic that a mage could possibly hold for a round against a troll if they managed to grab the right leverage.

 

[Legildur]

Thinking about it, I like the 2d10 approach as that practically mimics the existing d20 range of results. Using 3d6 requires too much (IMO) modification of the basic rules as Werk points out above. There are rules in Unearthed Arcana that cover off the adjustments required, but I would find it too much of a hassle to implement. 2d10, however, requires little or no adjustment (only the 'natural 1' corner case that I can conceive and how to treat critical threats, ie do you widen the threat range).

 

[woodelf]

Is there a simple and logical way to prevent these little inconsistencies from happening, because they tend to take me out of the game. It shatters my sense of disbelief, and that ain't cool. I need my escapism.

I was just wondering what other people might do.

Not a perfect fix, but a significant remedy:

mid20: replace all instances of rolling a d20 with rolling a "mid20"--roll 3 d20, and discard the highest and lowest. This significantly decreases the instance of very high and very low rolls. Some consideration needs to be put into how to deal with threats/crits if you do this. edit: and there are at least 3 easy solutions, 2 of which i've tried, but i don't have time to elaborate right now. maybe later.

While i've always just used mid20 for everything, i suppose you could also just use it for skill/ability checks, reasoning that you need the averaging quality for single checks, but that combat inherently averages out results, since you normally resolve a combat with multiple die rolls (compared to the single die roll of most skill check situations).

 

[Nebulous]

This keeps it simple in that you only have to roll one die and you don't need to add or average anything. However, it adds complexity to the number of different dice you have to roll. I like it though since it gives some of the less used dice a chance to shine

i prefer simplicity too, with the less additional math the better. Even if it's simple math. I'm always amazed when people starting quoting probability averages and curves. I find it all rather confusing

 

[Stalker0]

Sure there are ways to deal with the extrememes, but instead of changing the principal math the game is based on (d20 vs 2d10 vs 3d6 etc) why not just have the dm fix the extremems with a little dm fiat?

Okay in the 1 in 100,000,000 chance that there's actually a situation where a baby is going against a troll and then the 9% chance the baby actually wins, then the dm just has the troll knock down the door. Far simplier than changing the whole system

Also, if you would like, you can grant a large creature a +4 mod to the strength check per size category larger. Large creatures get a +4 to break objects, so it has some precedence.

 

[Drowbane]

The fighter was trying to push the door open, while the wizard notices the sign that says "pull."

classic!