A question: During our session the other night a situation occurred in which the crew were in one boat and their targets were in another. While they were still well apart from each other, one of the NPC targets pulled his pistol and took a shot at one of the PC’s.
I wasn’t immediately sure how to adjudicate it. None of the PC attributes seemed to cover a dodge type action, so I wasn’t sure what to have the PC roll. Should I have just had the NPC automatically hit and then let the PC resist? What’s the correct call here?
You wouldn’t tell them what action to use–players choose the action rating for rolls. So, if your player wants their character to take cover they say so and choose a fitting rating. Prowl or Finesse both make sense, maybe Survey (they saw the NPC raise their pistol). Then you set position and effect and resolve things as usual.
If this NPC is, like, a master sharpshooter, you might just make the player roll to resist getting shot–that seems in-line with the master NPC guidance in the book. If your shooter’s just some chump I’d give the PC a chance to hit the deck, as above.
Everything Sean says, but also typically in Blades NPC actions are covered by the PC roll, so something like them being hit would be a consequence of a PC roll.
Just the fact that he’s shooting might be part of the fiction that helps you set position and effect for whatever the PCs want to do, though.
If the action determines that the PCs take fire in a one-sided encounter, regardless of rolls, they take fire. They may resist the damage, but there is no action roll needed on their side. The fiction has consequences: if they jump off a tall building, there is no need to fail a roll to know they take damage, the only thing you need to know is how much they resist it.
Thanks for the replies. I think this gives me enough to go on. It does seem a little weird that NPC actions are entirely determined by the PC rolls, especially if the PC’s are perhaps unaware.
I think that is the wrong take-away, and will lead to players assuming a kind of invulnerability as long as they don’t need to roll. Imagine a trapped magic door (canonical example from the book). If the PCs decide not to investigate it, has bypassing their chance to find the trap, and touch it, the consequences of the fiction happen, and they get a change to resist it, but the consequence happening is driven by the fiction, not a player roll.
Yeah… I guess I still don’t really follow you here.
I mean, I understand the game well enough to run it, and we’ve been having quite a ball playing, but so far the situation of an unaware PC hasn’t really come up. I’m just still not sure how I’ll deal with it if it does.
Let’s say our PC is standing on a street corner and an enemy sniper is perched on a roof aiming at him. The PC is completely unaware of the sniper. The sniper fires.
So does the sniper just automatically hit and the PC resists?
Sean, please don’t think I don’t appreciate your efforts to help me out here. You obviously have a keen grasp of the game and I want to learn from you, but man, the last sentence in your above answer just makes no sense to me.
” If the PCs decide not to investigate it, has bypassing their chance to find the trap, and touch it, the consequences of the fiction happen, and they get a change to resist it, but the consequence happening is driven by the fiction, not a player roll.”
The word, “has” has really got me scratching my head. I feel like it must be a typo, but for the life of me I can’t figure out what you’re trying to say.
I think I kind of get the last part about consequences being driven by the fiction, so maybe that’s the important thing.
Oh, and just to clarify my example with the sniper, assume he’s not an expert marksman, so he does have a chance to miss.
At least it feels like he SHOULD have a chance to miss.
In a situation like this, whether or not the NPC misses is really a matter of the PCs’ position, not the result of any roll. (I mean, I suppose you could boil his chances of hitting down to a fortune roll, which would in turn influence the harm a PC would need to resist, but I don’t think you need to do that.) Consider these examples:
It’s a foggy day, the PCs are sticking to cover, the sniper is quite far away: the PCs are definitely in a controlled position. The sniper misses his first shot, but you start a clock: “Sniper Zeroes-In On Crew.” The PCs now have a chance to stop or eliminate that clock.
It’s an overcast day, the PCs are basically out in the open, the sniper has a decent nest: the PCs are in a standard position. The sniper hits, but it’s not a lethal shot. The PC resists against level 1 or 2 harm, and the crew needs to get that sniper eliminated ASAP.
It’s a clear day, the PCs are ambling around an open square, the sniper has a perfect nest: desperate position, natch. The sniper hits HARD. The PC resists against level 3 or 4 harm, and the crew scrambles to get the sniper out of the picture.
Sean Clancy I think that misses the point. You are assuming that the fictional position is mediated by a roll or a clock, when the fictional position could equally easily be the result of one. If I fill the clock “An Assassin has you in his sights,” then the assassin fires. Take harm, resist if you choose. This is not an active PC roll, the NPC just fires. In this case, firing is directly the result of a clock, but the reason why you do not allow the PCs to make active rolls to ignore the consequences of clocks/fiction should be obvious (also, that is what resistance rolls are for). For example: if a PC is being fired upon and has an opportunity to move to cover, but choses to face it, he takes damage–it doesn’t matter what he could have rolled–he chose to face the damage.
Sean Winslow I’m pretty sure we agree, fellow (correctly-spelled) Sean–but I’m not sure where I was unclear in the comment above your reply. (My bit about the fortune roll is more of an aside–I wouldn’t actually recommend that.) What I’m suggesting in my previous example is:
1. That the PCs’ position at any time can (and should) inform the relative success of any NPC’s activity (such as firing at a PC), and in turn the severity of of the consequence doled out
2. That a lesser consequence might be starting–but not completely filling–a clock (representing a sniper training their sights) that the PCs could work to counteract through appropriate action rolls–a successful group Prowl might mean the PCs hide in a pile of debris and the sniper loses sight of the crew
3. That a moderate or severe consequence might be just announcing that someone has been shot for 1-4 harm, which they would then be entitled to make a resistance roll against
Is that clearer? In that example I’m definitely not trying to suggest that the PCs should always have the chance to action roll their way out of harm. (To be fair, I’m also working this out in my own head for the first time, as I haven’t regularly encountered a scenario as described by OP.)
Thanks for the comments, Seans. It’s still a bit weird to me, but I think that gives me enough to work with.
Since you characterize position, which is only ever figured during an action roll, it gives the impression that you are violating fiction first. That said, the general structure of the examples is good.
Also, obviously, an unknown sniper shooting from cover without warning and striking is kind of a dick move unless it is a result of the situation (you started a war an enemy gang with a massacre; there is noble blood on your hands; you have angered the secret police). That said, PCs can resist, narrating how it narrowly misses, so it is not as much of a problem as in games where you just deal lethal damage.
I mean, the PCs always have a position, right? We might only say it out loud during engagement or an action roll, but it’s always there. (Otherwise I’m with you.)
Sent from my iPhone