Is it possible for a player to call a flashback between the roll and its resolution, in order to retroactively avoid the effects of a failed roll?
I’ll tell you what happened because it’s so fucking cool (my players are awsome).
They were in Lord Skurlock hous, celebrating a typical Tycherosi demon hunt.
Since they failed the engagement roll, they found themselves in the middle of the ghost trap labyrinth scurlock uses to keep the ghosts he’ll feed on.
Since they were neaby to the keystone of the labyrinth, the Slide and the Whisper drugged themselves, and the slide used his sex expertize (and demonic connection – they’re a cult) to stimulate the whisper and augment her psychic energies. She failed the attune roll to properly use the energies, and told us that she was feeling too good to properly concentrate.
So i asked the Slide: well, you’re the master of sexual energies. How do you direct them? In you two, binding your perceptions? In the spark-craft creation protecting you from ghosts? Or in the key-stone, making skurlock an enemy of yours?
Afterwards, the Whisper asked for having a demon energy trap with a flashback action. That’s cool and nice, (really, i enjoy that scenem it was one of the best of our game, sharing the character fears and vulnerabilies among bling demonic sex), but i fear that this could set a precedent.
Well, that sounds fucking cool!
First advice: talk to your table about it. What do they think you should be able to do?
Second advice, from me. The way I read this, the Whisper avoided the consequences of the Slide failing to Attune via this energy trap? What were the precise consequences? This is a bit hard to parse without knowing that.
In general, unless resisted, consequences from a failed roll just happen. However, the way consequences snowball, it can often happen that consequences from a bad roll leave the scoundrel(s) in an impossible situation, which they rescue themselves from via well-placed flashbacks, That’s great, and that’s the game working as intended. The consequences still happen (That’s important!), but your scoundrels are just good enough to have planned for them.
I’d say a Resistance roll is the most elegant solution to this. It’s fine if it’s handled in a “I just happened to have this with me” Flashback-y kinda way, but mechanically a Resistance roll is better than a shoehorned Flashback.
Go with the coolness. Rules takes backseat here IMO.
Flashbacks are in a unique space in the game, in that they can cost no stress or some stress – depending on the opinion of how big a stretch they are for the existing fiction.
I would totally allow a flashback in the middle of a poor roll, especially if it didn’t warrant a stress cost (for example.. armor to block a hit when only 1 load is previously marked). I only question such flashbacks when it Should require a stress cost (ie it makes no sense), but I think you could rule either way. And in doing know that you are helping to clarify or uphold the tone of the game (in other words, you are setting a precedent – perhaps an important one)