In the last game of DW, we dropped +1 Forward/Ongoing and replaced it with an extra die, take the best 2. It worked wonderfully.
This is totally stolen, and not original to me. And it is AWESOME.
In the last game of DW, we dropped +1 Forward/Ongoing and replaced it with an extra die, take the best 2.
In the last game of DW, we dropped +1 Forward/Ongoing and replaced it with an extra die, take the best 2.
I gotta say, it actually worked really well. Also, I like saying +1 advantage/disadvantage as opposed to forward.
Gotta try that. Thanks.
Yeah, Rob Donoghue used this method for the last DW game he ran, inspired by D&D 5e, and it’s a winner.
I adopted an advantage/disadvantage scheme (roll 3 and keep the best/worst 2) in my BoL/Heroes of Hellas/DW game and it did work very well.
Yeah, Rob Donoghue is whose article inspired me.
Little math, for the curious. Assuming a straight roll (like a last breath), some spreadsheeting reveals:
2d6: 6-, 42%, 7-9, 42%, 10+, 16%
2d6+1: 6-, 28%, 7-9: 44%, 10+: 28%
3d6, drop lowest: 6-: 20%, 7-9: 45%, 10+: 35%
Which is to say: With 3d6 drop lowest, there’s a lower chance of a 6-, about the same chance of a 7-9, and much higher chance of a 10+.
Hm. I’d hoped it wasn’t much more powerful, and just felt cooler. That may not be the case, as it alters the likelihood quite a bit.
I’m assuming the math works the same way for taking the lowest two on a disadvantage?
The advantage/disadvantage thing also comes with the idea that it doesn’t stack; you either have advantage, or you don’t have it, so if you got multiple +1’s to a thing, all you’d end up with in the new method is 3d6, drop lowest.
Vinney Cavallo Looks like 3d6 drop the lowest gives 68% of a 6-, 7-9 is 28%, 10+ is 5%. On 2d6-1, you get 58% on a 6-, 33% of a 7-9, 8% of a 10+.
Which amounts to: it is more extreme. Less chance of a 7-9, and a higher chance of a 6-.
Fred Hicks I didn’t realize that. I thought (and may be incorrectly remembering the post) that you could have multiples bonuses, and would pick up multiple extra dice.
William Nichols At least if you’re doing it the “5e way”, advantage a binary state you’re in or not, rather than something you can get multiples of. 🙂
Fred Hicks Yeah, I am unlikely to ever do anything the 5e way. Steal a good idea to use in my favorite games? Sure.
But, despite that I like to use spreadsheets when figuring out math, I don’t like spreadsheets at the gaming table.
Having played a session of 5e I can’t really support any assertion that a spreadsheet is needed at the gaming table, but to each his own. 🙂
I should probably judge it on its own merits, and not my memories of 4e’s character build. In fact — might as well read through it again.
Judged. 3 years iso-cubes for too many words, and unnecessary tables. For paragraphs I seem to need to read.
Misha Polonsky I will definitely try it in our next game.
How many dice could one reasonably add?
Wynand Louw As much as you could normally have pluses. And while each one changes the probability, you never get a zero percent chance of failure.
I think we saw a +2, thanks to the Barbarian. You could maybe do as much as +4 from various sources. So, that’s six dice in hand.
Yeah, I may very well try this out the next time I run a game. I was thinking of trying it out in my ongoing PbP games, but they’ve been going on for a while, and I don’t know how players will react.
I guess it doesn’t hurt to ask them at least.
Does adding extra die skew the difference compared to adding flat bonuses even more? Intuition says it would, but perhaps not…
Having used this in games before, Fred Hicks is right about not stacking. Either you should get one extra die (or penalty die) or not.
I mean, four dice keep the two highest is better than just having a +3, so there’s not much point in rolling more dice than that. Unless maybe you are using a lot of 12+ results and those are important, or if you’re not using numerical bonuses at all. Otherwise, meh.
What would the odds look like for rolling 2d6 twice, keeping the higher roll?
We’ve been playing this way for years, incorporating ALL bonuses, and plusses to a net dis/advantage (take best/worst two). We haven’t looked back. Its that BW wheel feeling when someone hands you a die for aid, or your Magical Sword gives you an extra die to the pool. It also means you are slightly more likely to fail (and earn xp) even when you have a +3 stat.
Peter Johansen Anydice.com can probably give you that.
Ok, I think I’ve got this right:
2d6: 6-, 42%, 7-9, 42%, 10+, 16%
2d6+1: 6-, 28%, 7-9: 44%, 10+: 28%
highest of 2d6 and 2d6: 6-: 17.4%, 7-9: 52%, 10+: 30.6%
3d6, drop lowest: 6-: 20%, 7-9: 45%, 10+: 35%