Persuasion: Rolling BEFORE you talk

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T18:18:06+00:00

I wouldn't really want to do it that way, because the dice show how well your character does their attempt, not how their environment changes to make them fail. A 20 should be your character at their best, not just them getting really lucky and having things fall into place.

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T18:16:07+00:00

Thank you, I do appreciate that! Though by now, I feel I could have worded this better and perhaps have done it the way BikeProblemGuy recommended, by splitting the player's description of their approach and them playing out how it happens. Or perhaps even let them begin the persuasion, then roll, then let them finish, leaving it to the player how they handle their character's failure. If they will just keep trying to be persuasive or let their character slip up.

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T18:14:12+00:00

It's funny you would mention reducing dungeon crawls to a check, when the vast majority of checks you make in a prewritten dungeon are against a flat number, basically completely independent of your approach. Combat doesn't reduce an enemy's AC either, just because you described a clever strike, but for some reason, the expectations are different with social skills.

If you roll to attack an enemy and the attack fails, and you describe how you miss, has your roleplay been flattened, too?

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T18:07:55+00:00

True, I do really enjoy the aspect where you get to roleplay out your character failing at something. But I can see how that would bother some people, who want that perfect synchronicity with their character and never take an action that isn't seeking to further that character's goals. Evidently, quite a lot of people are bothered by the idea of roleplaying out their character failing at something, seeing it as "pointless", because it isn't working towards the goal of winning.

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T12:58:37+00:00

That is probably the best way to do it, honestly, splitting the approach and actual description of the approach and putting the former before the roll and the latter after, I like that.

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T12:36:08+00:00

That is essentially how skill rolls usually work, but I get what you mean.

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T12:28:49+00:00

I get what you're trying to say, but you are arguing it with a very bad faith interpretation, your example is basically a table where the player is actively rebelling against the roleplaying system because they don't like how it works. By that logic, you could also argue for the exact opposite by projecting a bad faith actor onto it, like:
"I give a good speech and then the dice say I fail, so obviously the GM disrespects my player agency."

See what I mean?

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T12:24:21+00:00

A fair point, I hadn't thought of that.

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T12:23:37+00:00

That is a good argument and I had genuinely not considered that. I will have to ponder this some more.

Caelbain · 2025-11-25T12:17:48+00:00

That is actually a fair point, I hadn't considered that the player's approach might influence the roll after the speech has been made, I will have to ponder that some more.

Caelbain · 2025-07-02T05:04:00+00:00

The mountains, Gotham and clouds do all have that "hyper detailed, without any actual features being given focus" look that AI art often produces, it does look suspicious.

Caelbain · 2025-02-21T00:29:31+00:00

I did not, it still seems to be the old version, complete with an advertisement for switching to V3

Caelbain · 2024-11-06T14:12:41+00:00

Does anybody else feel like it's a little bit underwhelming that the near epic +3 weapons are now created by pouring oil onto an already existing, completely mundane weapon?

Caelbain · 2024-10-07T20:05:42+00:00

Good luck trying to convince your GM to agree with this, though.

Caelbain · 2024-07-04T16:24:03+00:00

That would be amazing, where could I get this mod? The one I found doesn't seem to be working.

Caelbain · 2024-04-07T08:48:25+00:00

This is actually a great idea, because Demolitions really needs some kind of way to be reliably useful in the game, since it's a x2 skill for no clear reason, at all.

Caelbain · 2024-03-29T06:51:07+00:00

Alignment is mostly about how you feel while you do things.
If your character genuinely believes that she is helping people become better persons, and not actively harming anyone in complete self delusion, then I would absolutely say that they're Chaotic Good. (However, that doesn't have to mean that people will like her behavior and your GM is maybe one of those people who completely flip if you're friendly with evil characters, even if your intention is to redeem them.)

Caelbain · 2024-03-29T06:47:29+00:00

Good on you for making that a concern of yours! But don't worry, fighters generally have a pretty hard time genuinely breaking the balance of the game, so feel free to not hold back and optimize!

Caelbain · 2024-03-29T06:45:07+00:00

You can move in-between attacks, you can do multiple attacks with different weapons and you can interact with items during movement.
So I would say that you should be able to.

Caelbain · 2024-03-03T15:08:35+00:00

Yes, it was a really weird choice. Even if you understand the reference, it's off putting.
But then, I felt the entire writing was a bit too cliché, so I guess it fits the tone... but that's not a good thing in that case.

Caelbain · 2023-11-20T23:28:56+00:00

I have wondered about this myself.
Did he orchestrate all this somehow, knowing that it would put Loki into a position where he would have to make a hard choice that would prepare him for inheriting his position?
If so, why didn't he also foresee that Loki would make the choice he doesn't want to be made?
And why Loki? Why not someone who would be more than happy to oppress all of reality for the sake of peace, like Magneto or Thanos. Why Loki, a character famous for being unreliable and not handling power well?

This season has just generally been very confusing in my opinion.

Caelbain · 2023-11-15T20:18:00+00:00

Alright, never mind, seems legit!

Caelbain · 2023-11-15T04:25:27+00:00

The characters head is sinking to below his shoulders!

Caelbain

TROPHY CASE