Post by Demonskunk in FIST: Ultra Edition comments

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So, I just got done with running my first two sessions and I have some feedback.

My players loved the tone and setting, but found the dice mechanics extremely frustrating. A flat 50% chance to fail without a bonus made them feel like the game does not reward skill or planning, but instead just blind luck, and it contributes to the fact that they feel like the intended method of play is too randomly roll up a character you aren't very invested in, then play them into they did very quickly and then roll a new character.

As the gm I feel like that probably isn't the intention, but I can understand why they feel that way. Most of the rolls last session were failures, even for the characters trying to do the things they had +1s or +2s in.

I adjusted the success numbers down a bit - 2-5 is a failure, 6-8 is a partial success, 9+ is a success - as a bandaid, but I… feel like maybe I want to suggest adding an Optional Rule to either grant a few freefloating attribute bonuses at character creation or slide the chance of outright failure closer to %25.

Either way, I hope this doesn’t come down as too negative, I’m just kind of frazzled and frustrated and looking for guidance.

CLAYMORE1 year ago(+1)

Not at all negative, this kind of stuff is always appreciated! For what it's worth, the chance of rolling a 6 or lower on 2d6 is 41.66%, so the baseline odds are slightly in the PC's favor.

This game takes a lot of inspiration from older games where the risk of failure was pretty high - say, you have to roll a 15+ on a d20 to pass a difficulty check - so a lot of the time, the most successful missions are ones where characters avoid rolling the dice as much as they can. This might mean staying out of combat, talking their way out of things with pure RP, setting up several boons to give themselves advantage when they do have to roll, etc.

Having characters be disposable, constantly die for pointless reasons, and only become a person you're willing to get attached to when they've stuck around for a few missions is 100% intentional - you're disposable soldiers, and the ones who are either strong or lucky enough to stick around will be the characters you end up fleshing out. That isn't to say I haven't seen several characters who players really got into before deploying then and managed to keep alive—it just helps to play starting level characters as though you were really there, and getting shot once or leaving one thing to chance could really, actually kill you. Also, I'd see if your players are interested in the pamphlet adventure we put out called HAZARD FUNCTION—it's a sort of microcosm of this idea where you play three Very weak characters at once and whoever makes it out alive graduates to being your "real" character.

That said, adding a floating +1 is a somewhat common house rule I've seen for the game. Giving out some extra WAR DICE, using the Chopper Chatter rule, or just encouraging players to choose them as rewards can also help with this; we added the mechanic so people who are having a string of bad rolls can push a check result up when it really counts!

CLAYMORE1 year ago(+1)

Oh, I should also add that character durability and competence increases dramatically around two or three level-ups—I'm running a game for some PCs who have levelled up two or three times and their attributes, loot, and player skill/cautiousness/cleverness make them sometimes untouchable

Demonskunk1 year ago(+1)

I used the Chopper Chatter optional rule, and also gave the players an extra War Die just for good measure, and they’ve just been bumbling through everything, barely able to succeed at anything, even the things they’re meant to be good at

I admittedly don’t fully understand where the ‘fun’ of having a ~25% chance of success comes in, but Claymore definitely seems a lot more generous than that.

I started playing TTRPGs with D&D 3/3.5 and I don’t think I fully understand the idea of getting through dangerous situations without rolling dice. Should I, like, not have my players roll to shoot if they have a clean sight line and are undetected? Or would that be, like, in the +2s territory?

Eduardo1 year ago(+1)

Seems like you see only 10+ as success, that's a 'mistake'.
7+ are successes too.
So, with a flat 2d6 roll you have 58,33% chance of success. A +1 makes that 72,22% and a +2 83,33%.
Maybe, and I'm trying to guess here, you (or the GM) is being too harsh on 'partial success' results (7+).

Demonskunk1 year ago(+1)

The ~25% chance of success wasn’t in FIST, I was referencing to the OSR style games that Claymore referenced where you need to roll a 15+ on a D20.

But I admittedly do struggle with the partial successes. I’m not good at figuring out what a ‘complication’ should be necessarily. Sometimes I can’t think of a complication related to the roll that feels appropriate without making it an effective failure.

Like, one of my players was trying to sneak up a ladder while a person nearby it was distracted. Rolled a partial success. What do I do there? I had one of the rungs on the ladder snap underfoot when they reached the top of the ladder, alerting the guy at the top and bottom of it, but giving them time to react before being seen.

This felt like “Success with a complication” to me but “Failure” to them.

CLAYMORE1 year ago (3 edits) (+3)

That sounds like a partial success, but if it doesn’t sound like one to the player, you can always pause the game to talk about why! The rulebook also touches on how the referee and players can avoid creating this dissonance in the first place – ask if you’re giving them enough information to make good decisions; prompt them to give you details about how they’re trying to do something; experiment with telling players upfront what will happen if they roll a partial or failure on an action they’re considering. As referee, you’re acting as the game environment, so you’re supposed to surprise the player but also telegraph what to expect to a degree that allows them to account for it if they try. Both player and referee must be able to accurately extrapolate and strategize around likely risks. Here’s an imagined run of your scenario, with plenty of material to play off of provided by both parties:

REF: “So, you’re heading toward the ladder. It’s old, a little warped. You can see the guard still trying to scrape the gum off their boot, but they’re probably not super invested in that, so you’ll have to be quiet… how are you doing this?”

PLAYER: “I’m gonna slip off my shoes and string them around my neck so I don’t make noise on the rungs.”

REF: “Okay, roll TACTICAL…”

PLAYER: “I got a 7.”

REF: “You make it up the ladder without a sound – until the very last rung. As you heave yourself onto the roof, it snaps and clatters one thunk at a time down the ladder. Gumshoe down there staggers out of flamingo stance and glances around, and at the same time you realize you’re not alone up here – there are footsteps approaching, but not with any urgency. There are no shadows on hand to duck into. What’s your move?”

If the players are properly prepped for the pulp action tone, this should feel like the next exciting catalytic beat. A good action movie is rarely one where the hero is never noticed and gets home half an hour early. If anyone is having trouble getting in the groove of FIST, we suggest watching any movie (or video game, or whatever) you can map to its mechanics, which is how the game was created and is the main point of it. Here’s a clear example of a sequence of partial successes: Garth Marenghi's Gun Possession

If the player is dissatisfied with the results of a bad roll, they may not realize the game won’t happen if no bad rolls do because bad rolls give the environment opportunities to progress and interact with the players’ agency. It might be helpful to go over these parts of the book with the whole table to get you all on the same page and in the right frame of mind:

p.5 Rolling the dice

p.7 Playing dirty

p.16 Playing fair

p.17 Quality fiction

p.19 Using agency

p.21 Referee FAQ

These sections go over stuff like preparing for and embracing the consequences of bad rolls as the dramatic meat of the game, how you can use creative thinking and strategy to tip stacked odds to your favor, what the table should mutually agree on, and general referee tips. There's also a spark table for partial successes on page 148.

Hope this helps and isn’t too much of a wall!

Demonskunk1 year ago(+2)

No, quite the contrary, I really appreciate you taking the time to respond to me. it really shows that you care about my experience with your game!

I'll keep this in mind next time I give the game a try. I think I'll give my players a couple advances to start with and see if that eases things a bit.

Also that gun possession video is HILARIOUS.

itch.io

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