Quote from: beejazzLet's say you want to attack. Roll your dicepool + Your ability (strength or whatever) vs. 6 + their ability (reflex). If you get enough successes (a function of armor) you hit.

Then you do damage. Roll your dicepool + your ability vs. 6 + their ability(toughness). Number of successes determines damage dealt.

Or you want to cast a spell on someone. Roll dicepool + your ability vs. 6 + their ability (luck or sanity or what have you, depending on the spell and which iteration of the game you play).

The six is kind of a stand in for the dice on the defense (kind of like how in D20, the arbitrary +10 to AC stands in for rolling your defense against every attack).

So you are adding the ability number to the number rolled by each individual die? Yup, your head be stuck something serious in D20 space.

Quote from: beejazzI've seen "Don't Rest Your Head"... that the sort of thing you're talking about? Like all that "pain dice" "fatigue dice" bull?

Dunno. Never seen "Don't rest your head."

The main culprit here I am alluding to is oWoD. Though it produced many immitators.

Anyway, yeah... we're trying to avoid crap like that.

You might be able to add dice to your pool in special circumstances, but no crazy re-rolls, re-interprets, dice of diferrent colors where the color that hits highest determines what the cost to your mental health (the game I'm referencing)... Nothing as wierd as that.

Quote from: RPGPunditDice pools are pretty well the devil incarnate.

RPGPundit

So does this make me the devil's advocate?

Also, blakkie, you mentioned subtractive dicepools... I didn't quite get the explanation... care to elaborate?

Quote from: beejazzAlso, blakkie, you mentioned subtractive dicepools... I didn't quite get the explanation... care to elaborate?

I'm talking about determining the final TN. Then you roll the dice and compare they directly against that TN instead manipulating each die's result to see if it matches or exceeds the TN.

But at the root of the problem basically, as far as I could tell, you were using Abilities like the D-Minus system only handling it in an even more awkward way. :eek:

Quote from: blakkieI'm talking about determining the final TN. Then you roll the dice and compare they directly against that TN instead manipulating each die's result to see if it matches or exceeds the TN.

Oh... so target number as a function of roll under x. Then number of successes based on the difficulty of the task. Right?

QuoteBut at the root of the problem basically, as far as I could tell, you were using Abilities like the D-Minus system only handling it in an even more awkward way. :eek:

D-Minus what now?

Quote from: beejazzOkay, I know what a dicepool is. However, having only ever played DnD (and having a copy of GURPS:Hellboy and the ADnD monster manual) I haven't actually used them.

IMHO there is no sense in re-inventing the wheel. If you can get someone to loan you copies, check out: Shadowrun 4, and nWoD, or the more obscure Burning Wheel, and Arrowflight.

 You can also check out the d6 system or O.R.E. to see some different ways of doing die pools as well.

 If for no other reason than to see how it has been done before.

Quote from: beejazzI've heard them described as clunky, usually in reference to Exalted. I've also heard it said that Exalted goes as high as 17 or 30 dice.

Yes, they can be clunky, just like any other game system. But Exalted is also very popular game line, so opinions vary.

My advice, Pick one variable for task resolution.

You either alter the Target Number, The amount of dice in the pool, or the number of successes it takes to do something.

The non-clunky die pool systems only really have one of the three elements above as a variable.

In my expierience, when the outcome of a task is affected by both an altering TN, and number of successes, the clunk factor tends to go up big time.

And if die-pools are the devil incarnate, then 3.5/d20 is the angry god that cast him down - because he was jealous that games less popular than him had better mechanics.


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Quote from: JaegerAnd if die-pools are the devil incarnate, then 3.5/d20 is the angry god that cast him down - because he was jealous that games less popular than him had better mechanics.

/me pats there Jeager on the head.

There, there. We now your system is less popular. It's okay to like less popular system. You don't have to justify yourself.

Quote from: Caesar SlaadI generally disdain dice pools. But, that being said, I find the ones most tolerable to deal with are those that don't have any special little gimmicks that designers used to love to shove in, but make the system a pain to deal with in play. Things like cancelling or adding successes, exploding dice, etc., make your system more tedious and less transparent to understand in play.

KISS is definately a great rule of thumb, if not goal. The less time spent fiddling/analyzing the dice the better. Which is why exploding dice may or may not be preferable.  On d10s though it isn't as much of an issue as d6s.

Quote from: beejazzOh... so target number as a function of roll under x. Then number of successes based on the difficulty of the task. Right?

Well you could do a roll-under, but that's not what I had in mind.

I'm still sensing a real disconect here between what you are saying and what I'm hearing, and visa versa.

I'm suggesting that the TN remain what you want to meet or exceed with a die. I'm just saying that it is a whole lot of clutter for the player to constantly be adding to his individual die roll to figure out if the roll exceeds the TN.

So the TN should always be something in the range of 1 to 10, and it is compared directly to the number that comes up on the die.

Quote from: JaegerMy advice, Pick one variable for task resolution.

You either alter the Target Number, The amount of dice in the pool, or the number of successes it takes to do something.

The non-clunky die pool systems only really have one of the three elements above as a variable.

Two works if you have clear rules about which represents what.  Otherwise you run into problems trying to figure out what a modifier is suppose to be changing.

QuoteIn my expierience, when the outcome of a task is affected by both an altering TN, and number of successes, the clunk factor tends to go up big time.

I think the underlying problem there is that the odds get away from you really fast.  The usuable part of the probabilities, the part where any change in one of the variables matters, becomes much smaller because the effects of those two variables are very synergistic.

@blakkie: I may still be stuck in d20 land, but what!? Roll high but 10 or under? But how do I modify my chances of success on an individual die? Where would things like ability scores come in? Ack!

I thought you meant something like rolling under your ability score x number of times (which made alot of sense to me at the time... keeping both TN and number of successes variable allows dicepools to remain fairly small... at least until people buy more.)

Anyway, the misunderstanding did give me what I thought might be a great idea for a 6d6 pool system, though...

@Jong: YES!

Quote from: beejazzRoll high but 10 or under?

Last I checked the highest my d10 goes is "10". You have some of those Spinal Tap d10s that go up to "11"?  :rimshot:

For example nWoD using a fixed TN 8.  So any die roll 7 and under fails, any 8s, 9s, or 10s are successes.

SR3 uses d6s and can have TNs that are above 6. However what they do is when you roll a 6 you then reroll adding six to the die roll.  For TNs 13 to 18 you must have rolled at least back to back 6s and then the third roll of that die +12 must be enough to break the TN.  One odd conciquence of this is that TN 6 and 7, 12 and 13, etc. are equally difficult because you can't roll a zero on a d6. It also has some other issues.

Some people I've talked with do the same thing with SR3 exploding dice that Hackmaster does with penetration damage (which is effectively exploding dice). Each exploder is actually d6 - 1. So if you roll 6 + 6 + 2 you get 6 + 5 + 1, for a total of 12. It gets around the TN 6-7 issue and mathematically just means that the average result is 4 instead of 3.5. I've never used it myself but they seemed to enjoy it.

If you're going with floating TN and exploding dice it might be worth considering. The interesting thing is that no matter what the die used, the end result is to just add 0.5 to the normal average for that die. I haven't done the math for it, I'm just taking the word of the multiple guys with engineering degrees that worked on the system for Hackmaster.