In which I reconsider how I dealt with a partial success in the engagement roll for the Upper Deck Job and think about how I’ll utilize them in the future.
Sean Nittner, Pete Cornell and Jason Bowell were there for the job.
https://githyankidiaspora.wordpress.com/2017/08/01/re-thinking-the-upper-deck-job/
Good advice and something I’ll be taking to heart too. My people often do fall back immediately to “kill ’em all” because of consequences, and that’s why the Leech has 3 dots in Skirmish.
Yeah. I don’t want the crew to decide to never try a stealth mission again because if they don’t roll straight 6’s it’ll turn into a clusterfuck.
One of the things that strikes me is that we call a 4 or 5 a partial success (and that’s what John calls It), when the book tells us that it’s a full success, but with a complication. They do what they intended but with a consequence. I think this factors in to how we interpret the result as being less than what is desired.
A relevant section:
“Don’t inflict a complication that negates a successful roll. If a PC tries to corner an enemy and gets a 4/5, don’t say that the enemy escapes. The player’s roll succeeded, so the enemy is cornered… maybe the PC has to wrestle them into position and during the scuffle the enemy grabs their gun.” p30
I struggle with this too, but hope I’m getting better. Light touch with the 4/5s to justify the mean 1-3s.
Engagement feels like a special case. I notice for the example in the book (Dimmer Sisters) even a Desperate result on an Infiltration approach is still, at the point of contact, an Infiltration and hasn’t yet gone pear-shaped. I didn’t quite follow that example last time out.
This is a big part of why I find clocks on the table help the flow so much. Without them, the cost of a 4-5 is discouraging.
Useful, thoughtful post.
Mark Wiand Good point.
Matthew Gagan Yeah. It is important to remember that a failed roll just means the mission is going to start in a state of high tension.
Rob Donoghue Thanks, Rob!
Yeah, I’d keep in mind that even if the result is a failure on engagement, it should be a “desperate position”, not already having failed at their approach. I would always try to give them a chance to recover but serious consequences if they can’t.
I would also try to make sure the next roll after the engagement is related to their approach, so if they were trying to be deceptive or stealthy, give them a chance to get out of the situation with deception or stealth.
I’ve only run a couple of games but I’m really happy with how the first mixed-success engagement roll went. The players were trying to get into a merchant’s basement by posing as ratcatchers (and in fact had snuck some rats into their upper window the day before). Despite their preparations, they got a 4-5 on the roll. So when they showed up, the merchant was already talking to a ratcatcher that said he had a contract for this whole street and hadn’t seen them before – their situation was risky, it was more difficult than they expected, but they still had the opportunity to continue their deception before the approach failed (say, someone shouting for the bluecoats).