From: durrell@pinball.arcade.uiowa.edu (Bryant Durrell)
Subject: Re: Vampire vs. Hero vs. Gurps etc...(Long!)
Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1992 02:07:54 GMT
Organization: University of Iowa

In article <1992Nov21.202507.5827@news.columbia.edu> jhk6@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (John H Kim) writes:
>durrell@pinball.arcade.uiowa.edu (Bryant Durrell) writes:
>>It splits up the concept of how difficult something is to do and 
>>how well you need to be able to do it, which is pretty rare in RPGs.

>	But this difference is *completely arbitrary*, as the examples 
>show. Whether you want to call catching the torch by the wrong end a 
>'marginal success' or a 'failure' is pointless and serves only to 
>complicate things. Another GM might call for a higher difficulty and 
>say that catching it by the wrong end was a 'failure'. Neither of these 
>choices is right or wrong - they are both equally valid. Hence requiring 
>this choice is useless. 

Not that arbitrary.  I can set the base point anywhere along the 
spectrum from failure to success, which (imho) allows me to make some 
useful distinctions.  There's certainly a difference between catching 
the torch by the wrong end, missing it completely, and knocking it 
into something flammable, right?  You don't have to find this
distinction useful.  I happen to like it.

>[My example of climbing a tree deleted]

>>All I can say is that I don't find it very hard at all.  Whether 
>>you want to set the difficulty at 4 and require 7 successes, or vice 
>>versa, depends on your conception of the task. If it's easy to get started 
>>on something but you need to work on it for a while, or you need to do a lot 
>>better than the bare minimum, then it's a low difficulty number and a high 
>>number of successes. Hard to do, but you only need a slightly better than 
>>average success?  High target, low number of successes.

>	As I said, these differences are all a matter of interpretation. 

Um.  Absolutely.  Setting skill roll modifiers in GURPS is also a matter 
of interpretation.  Ditto Hero.  Are you saying that any game that 
relies on GM interpretation isn't worthwhile?

> [stuff deleted]

>	All of this confusion can be eliminated by just having a method of 
>rolling which *always* distinguishes how well you do. Ars Magica, for example, 
>distinguishes between marginal success and great successes *as well as* 
>marginal failures and awful failures - with greater simplicity and no 
>arbitrary distinction on the part of the GM. 

Refresh me on this, please?  I just sold my copy of 2nd. Ed AM (not
cause I disliked it, cause I never get to play) and I forget the
mechanism.  You may be right, since I never got to play enough AM to
become familiar with the mechanics.  Sigh.  (Note that Vampire does
always distinguish how well you do, it's just that it often doesn't
matter much.)

> [more deleted]

>	Hello? What exactly is the 'added flexibility' you gain by 
>having a defense roll vs. an attack roll rather than a modified attack 
>roll? 

I was more thinking of the GURPS-style roll attack then roll defense
versus the AD&D-style roll attack minus a defense modifier which
remains the same for a given opponent on each attack.

Bryant
durrell@chop.isca.uiowa.edu