Peter Keay on Warpcast

Content pfp

0 reply

0 recast

0 reaction

Peter Keay pfp

D&D Dice! One fun rule for DMs is *degrees of success*. This is baked into some systems like 40k, but not D&D. The dice can tell you more than just “success” or “fail”. Say your player must leap an abyss. The difficulty is 12. Not bad. Yes, we all know about criticals. A player rolls a 20, they murder it. Eyes closed, dramatic frontflip, even calling in a successful Chinese food order in the air along the way. The player rolls a 1, critical fail. They slip and dive into the abyss. Unless someone casts feather fall, they might die. But what if they roll *exactly* 12? You can say they *barely make it.* A foot slips into the abyss, or one of their companions snatches their hand to pull them forward. What about an 11? Well, dying in an abyss sucks. So a good DM can have them almost make it, hang from the edge. Maybe an item from their pack slips out into the void. An 18 is comfortable, a 14 not so much. This can feed more interesting storytelling than just seeing 12+ and saying “you make it!”

1 reply

1 recast

5 reactions

IDEKAツ pfp

I love using this mechanic. Using this example, if a player rolled an 11, I'd have the players already across make a DEX check to catch them. Or if a player assists in a roll like investigation. and the first roll is poor but the second roll passes, I'll say they don't see anything until the player assisting them points out something odd and they go to investigate that specifically. All about being a good story teller and thinking quick on your feet. That's why I actually prefer being a DM than a player.

1 reply

0 recast

2 reactions