Using M-Space conflict rules including all PCs at once

[Runeblogger]

Hi, the other day I used the conflict rules from M-Space in the samurai campaign I'm running.
Well, kind of, since I (still) don't have the book, but I have Rev d100 and I've been reading some comments about it. However, I wonder if anyone has used those rules for group contests?

In that session, the minion NPC was riding a horse, trying to escape from the PCs, who followed him galloping on their own horses also at full speed. What I did was:

I used the average of each horse's CON+DEX as the pool of points to be depleted, while the PCs and NPC used mostly their Ride skill in opposed tests. However, if I had had the 4 players roll each turn against the same roll of the minion, they would have had a clearly false advantage against him. So what one of my players immediately suggested (good boy!) was for the minion NPC to have four different pools of "hit points" and every PC could only "damage" one of them during the conflict. The minion would hurt every PC's individual pool as long as his roll was a better success than each of their individual rolls.

In this way, the PC who managed to reduce to zero the particular pool of the minion he could hurt would be the PC who would manage to get to him first.
If the minion would have managed to reduce to zero the pool of every PC, he would have gotten away.

I also had them change the rolls at some points. For example, when the minion reached a settlement, he tried to quickly convince the guards that he was being chased by 4 violent bandits. So when the PCs arrived, they had to roll their Influence or Oratory against the minion's successful roll or lose 1D6 points of their own pool, which represented the maneuvers they had to do in order to avoid the guards trying to stop them for questioning.

My players seemed to like it this way. But I wonder how would you have handled this.   Or if the actual rules are very different from this approach!

Edited March 3, 2018 by Runeblogger

[Matt_E]

1 hour ago, Runeblogger said:

Hi, the other day I used the conflict rules from M-Space in the samurai campaign I'm running.
Well, kind of, since I (still) don't have the book, but I have Rev d100 and I've been reading some comments about it. However, I wonder if anyone has used those rules for group contests?

In that session, the minion NPC was riding a horse, trying to escape from the PCs, who followed him galloping on their own horses also at full speed. What I did was:

I used the average of each horse's CON+DEX as the pool of points to be depleted, while the PCs and NPC used mostly their Ride skill in opposed tests. However, if I had had the 4 players roll each turn against the same roll of the minion, they would have had a clearly false advantage against him. So what one of my players immediately suggested (good boy!) was for the minion NPC to have four different pools of "hit points" and every PC could only "damage" one of them during the conflict. The minion would hurt every PC's individual pool as long as his roll was a better success than each of their individual rolls.

In this way, the PC who managed to reduce to zero the particular pool of the minion he could hurt would be the PC who would manage to get to him first.
If the minion would have managed to reduce to zero the pool of every PC, he would have gotten away.

I also had them change the rolls at some points. For example, when the minion reached a settlement, he tried to quickly convince the guards that he was being chased by 4 violent bandits. So when the PCs arrived, they had to roll their Influence or Oratory against the minion's successful roll or lose 1D6 points of their own pool, which represented the maneuvers they had to do in order to avoid the guards trying to stop them for questioning.

My players seemed to like it this way. But I wonder how would you have handled this.   Or if the actual rules are very different from this approach!

You already know my suggestion... :-)  I would set up a Task, and in this case I would have each of the two teams attempt to complete it, with the higher point total winning the day--or you could have the first team to a target Task score be the winner, which would emphasize the racing aspect.  Having 2 teams, not 4 against 1, seems rather natural, and avoids the problem you mentioned.  Call for 2 rolls of Ride, 1 roll of the mount's Athletics, and 1 of its Endurance; the team of 4 may use either the best Rider's score, and whatever scores apply for that character's mount, or may be led by the most Athletic or Enduring mount, and whatever score applies for its rider.

I think your way works well, though, and may be simpler (but maybe not).

 

[Runeblogger]

Haha  of course, that would have been another valid option.

however, in this particular chase, the PCs didn't want to wait for the slowest horse to catch up, they just cared about stopping the minion before he got on board a ship, so it was clear to me they were 4 teams against 1. Each of them wanted to be the first, so each wanted to do their own rolls. I guess it isn't a very common case in games, but anyway.

[clarence]

That's an interesting asymmetrical setup. I would probably make damage asymmetrical as well. The villain would deal 1d6 damage to all four pursuers (if rolling a 3 all pursuers take 3 each). But only the fastest PC deals damage to the villain. And I would say the fastest PC is the one who rolls best each round (ie. the highest success). 

The thinking behind this is that a fast villain will outrun all four pursuers. But the pursuers are only as fast as the best rider. 

[Runeblogger]

58 minutes ago, clarence said:

That's an interesting asymmetrical setup. I would probably make damage asymmetrical as well. The villain would deal 1d6 damage to all four pursuers (if rolling a 3 all pursuers take 3 each). But only the fastest PC deals damage to the villain. And I would say the fastest PC is the one who rolls best each round (ie. the highest success). 

The thinking behind this is that a fast villain will outrun all four pursuers. But the pursuers are only as fast as the best rider. 

That's a cool way of making things simpler. But aren't these rolls opposed? So if the villain rolls a 34 with 35%,  any player who gets a higher normal success (e.g. 40 out of 60%) should not be "damaged" by the villain, should he?

And who gets first to the villain? If it's the player who got the best rolls overall, you need to keep track of each player's rolls. 

Edited March 3, 2018 by Runeblogger

[clarence]

You can deal damage in two ways, either as a team or as an individual.

As a team: Let's say the villain rolls 34 (with Ride 35%). A PC rolling 40 (with Ride 60%) wins the opposed roll and only the villain takes damage, ignoring the other PC's rolls. 

Individually: Again, only the best PC at 40 will cause the villain any damage. But the villain in turn cause damage to every PC rolling worse. So, the villain might be beaten by one PC (and takes damage) but rolls better than the three others (and deals damage to only those three). 

Who gets there first? Well, either the PC with the most successful rolls or the PC with the highest Conflict Pool when the villain reaches zero. For individual damage, I would use the latter. Otherwise I would keep track of successful rolls, as the PC with the highest Conflict Pool will always get there first if everyone gets the same damage round after round. 

Did that make any sense?

[Matt_E]

11 hours ago, Runeblogger said:

Haha  of course, that would have been another valid option.

however, in this particular chase, the PCs didn't want to wait for the slowest horse to catch up, they just cared about stopping the minion before he got on board a ship...Each of them wanted to be the first, so each wanted to do their own rolls.

To me, the second sentence above is quite separate from the first.  If each player wants to try to be the winner, fine; then in my setup you have 4 heroes + 1 villain all competing in the Task.  That's more dice rolling, but otherwise is the same game mechanic as for just 2 teams.  It also improves the chance that (at least one of) the heroes will prevail.  The first sentence, though, suggests to me that nobody really cares who stops the villain--the opposite of the second sentence, to me--, which is why I outlined what I did.

As we can see, the good news is that there are numerous satisfactory approaches to modeling this situation. :-)  Your Mythras is Your Mythras!

 

[Matt_E]

7 hours ago, clarence said:

That's an interesting asymmetrical setup. I would probably make damage asymmetrical as well. The villain would deal 1d6 damage to all four pursuers (if rolling a 3 all pursuers take 3 each). But only the fastest PC deals damage to the villain. And I would say the fastest PC is the one who rolls best each round (ie. the highest success). 

The thinking behind this is that a fast villain will outrun all four pursuers. But the pursuers are only as fast as the best rider. 

Yes, I agree:  In this method, the villain needs to deal "damage" to each of the pursuers, else it is radically unfair.

About Clarence's final sentence above:  In a sense, the definition of "best rider" is the only actual question, in choosing a mechanism for this scene.  If you believe "best rider" means "the character with the highest Ride score", then that never changes throughout the scene, and you just have that one static character compete against the villain, in every contested roll of the extended challenge.  However, if you believe "best rider" means "the character who rolled best this time around", that title is dynamic, and could be different for every contested roll of the extended challenge, so you have all 4 heroes roll every time. :-)

The more I think about it, the more I like having all 4 heroes roll in the extended challenge (no matter how exactly you structure the rolling).  Not only does it seem more realistic, but it engages every player at the table, which is an inherent good, to me.

 

Edited March 3, 2018 by Matt_E

[Runeblogger]

Yes, that makes a lot of sense! Thank you both for your ideas! 

(notes eveything down for next time there's such a chase scene)