I saw a discussion of this once upon a time, and now I can’t find it again. Maybe it was on Reddit?
The Barbarian die rolling thing seems a bit awkward to me, particularly in online play. I saw a proposal somewhere to change the Barbarian back to 2d6+stat, with a +1 ongoing whenever following a passion. Whenever the player rolls doubles, the Barbs passions overwhelm him.
Anybody remember where this is from? Anybody ever tried it? The difference between the two rolling techniques is less than 5% – any other drawbacks to this change? Something I’m missing?
I’m not sure what problem you are trying to solve here. What is awkward about “is one die higher than the other”?
Nah, I prefer the modded 2d6 method as well. Do what thou wilt man.
you lose a bunch of interesting play by removing the if the 6 rolls higher than the 8, for very small saving of typing effort
Michael Phillips
I don’t think anything is lost if you use the “If you roll doubles” method, but frankly, I don’t really see the difference or any reason to switch. Functionally, they are entirely equivalent to me.
I guess my objections are this –
1) on Roll20 in particular, it takes a moment to determine which die is which, it interrupts my flow of thought jumping back and looking for the die silhouettes. A match would be much easier to spot.
2) Aesthetically, it doesn’t feel right. Almost every other move is based around the 2d6+stat, this one feels awkward. I don’t see anything gained by making the change; there doesn’t seem to be anything interesting mechanically that is hooked into the odd dice.
Makes sense if you’re playing in Roll20, I think, since as you say, it’s much harder to tell the dice apart.
Roll20 specifically gives an icon for each die it rolls. I’d have though that would be easier than some of the ones that just give you the numbers