I am considering a system wherein players roll a stat score, based on the relevant stat, against a difficulty that is scaled in the same values as the stat score. However, the reason for posting is that I am considering a secondary mechanism whereby if the stat matches the difficulty the roll for success is replaced by a roll (or other mechanism) to determine time. That is, the actor will not fail the task, but instead test to see how long it will take him to achieve a basic, average, level of success. I would caveat that this system is optional, and that the player always has the choice to roll fewer dice in order to gamble for more than basic success, but wtih the risk of failure.

With a system like this, the player doesn't fuck up at an inopportune and game-breaking moment, but dramatic tension still exists in the form of a time factor - for instance can the computer programmer decode the virus in time? So he will ultimately succeed, but can he do it quick enough.

Even in combat, i can see this potentially working: you could roll to see how long it would take the character to defeat the enemy - if all things remain equal he will kill the dragon in x rounds. But are all things equal, what if the dragon rolls a quicker result?

The problem then is how to determine time, and if the 'time roll' that replaces the action roll is based on a stat value where higher represents better ability, how do more success translate to quicker times?

this reminds me of Bushido RPG by FGU.
Task resolution had much to do with time segments or something...might want to check it out for some ideas.

I think it is a good idea. Task Types can have similar time requirements/units. Study = +/-15 min. per success
vehicle Chase = +/2 sec. lead per succ.
influence = +/-3 min. per succ.
mellee combat = ....
computer interface = ...

each one mod. by Att. + Skill + equip. etc...

or something like that.

I'm just not sure how to measure time, nor do i want gameplay to become a complex exercise in time measurement. I think the principle is sound: no need for actions to just randomly fail (ie fail at a point that would ruin the gameplay/fun), but to compensate checking for success is replaced by another factor. In this case it's time, but how to work this. Or maybe not time, but something else.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;426305*snip*
 That is, the actor will not fail the task, but instead test to see how long it will take him to achieve a basic, average, level of success.
*snip*

With a system like this, the player doesn't fuck up at an inopportune and game-breaking moment, but dramatic tension still exists in the form of a time factor - for instance can the computer programmer decode the virus in time? So he will ultimately succeed, but can he do it quick enough.

Even in combat, i can see this potentially working: you could roll to see how long it would take the character to defeat the enemy - if all things remain equal he will kill the dragon in x rounds. But are all things equal, what if the dragon rolls a quicker result?

The problem then is how to determine time, and if the 'time roll' that replaces the action roll is based on a stat value where higher represents better ability, how do more success translate to quicker times?

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;426626I'm just not sure how to measure time, nor do i want gameplay to become a complex exercise in time measurement. I think the principle is sound: no need for actions to just randomly fail (ie fail at a point that would ruin the gameplay/fun), but to compensate checking for success is replaced by another factor. In this case it's time, but how to work this. Or maybe not time, but something else.

:hmm: you seem to be saying two different things with these posts...how can a mechanic relate to the time it takes to accomplish if you do not want to keep track of time!
:huhsign:

The amount of time to do something critical in real life is completely random. There is no way to codify the complexities of the real interplay of skill, equipment, pressure, familiarity, and luck. Disarming a bomb could take 10 seconds or 2 hours.

Any number you pick for an RPG is perfectly fine.

That said, sense you are trying to create dramatic tension, the times you select for the roll should have more to do with the game than how long things, "really take."

So imagine the scene where someone is trying to disarm / plant the bomb, crack the safe, untie the ropes, hack the computer, or open the door. In that scene, you have a couple basic elements: how long the bad guys take to get there and how much resistance your fellow players can provide while you work.

Assume that it always takes the bad guys in a critical situation about a minute to arrive. A good success should be just under a minute, meaning he can finish the task before the fight starts.

A regular success should be just enough time to get done before the other players are over run and killed. If it were 1st level Pathfinder characters, I'd say 7 more rounds because that is about how long it would take 4 guys to hack through three people if there wasn't any resistance. So for a regular success, I'd say a minute and thirty.

For a shitty success, I'd say it takes about 2 minutes and thirty because that gives the bad guys a minute to break down a barricade, and then still have time to chop through and get you.

A failure would take five minutes, meaning someone in the group will have to do something really heroic to buy the key man time to finish.

You could almost make the levels of success read in situation terms like:

Great Success: Instant Task Completion
Good Success: Task Completed before Combat
Rgular Success: Task Completed after quick Combat
Poor Success: Task Completed after long Combat
Failure: Task Completed after two combat lengths

Weapons of the Gods has something called a style roll, where you roll to see how well you did (iirc) with your automatic success. Maybe something like that would be better. But it would need to maintain the dramatic tension.

The point isn't that i want to track the passage of time (as that i fear will be massively tedious and awkward), but to allow players to get a free level of success on certain actions in exchange for something else. That something else is what I mean by dramatic tension.

The one thing I really liked from the One Roll Engine (ORE) was how, true to the system's name, they handled "success" and "time to completion" with a single roll.

You roll your d10 dice pool and look for matches (i.e. identical results). The matching die result is referred to as "height", and the number of matching dice as "width" (e.g. four dice showing up 9 would be 4x9).

Height gives you degree of success and width gives you speed of completion (the bigger the width, the faster the action is completed). In combat, this doubles as initiative; and of course, the degree of success gives you the basis for damage.

All in all a pretty tight design, with every single roll cramming in plenty of information about the action concerned.

Time is just going to be too nebulous to define on its own. How would it work in combat where time is defined elsewhere (initiative)?

One thing you do need to account for is that sometimes people do fail, regardless of time.  Or time based success would need to be declared ahead of time because you can't really decide after the fact as you fall from the cliff face, that maybe you should have taken longer.

I'd suggest that you simply make the player choose before the action.  Do you want to test against immediate success/failure OR do you want to marginally succeed and just test to see how long it will take.

Even in a time test there still needs to be a possibility of failure.