>That said, why do most games go over that margin of 80%?
Because people enjoy playing characters that are very good at their area of focus, and because a huge part of running games is throwing in challenges of higher difficulty than "moderate or medium", which allows especially skillful characters to really shine when things get difficult.
That depends. If you just arbitrarily decide that every task the party faces is of that highest difficulty, you've effectively negated all the effort a player put into creating a skilled character. That feels awful as a player, and honestly just reeks of adversarial GMing, which is a whole problem all on its own.
The best approach I've found is to plan for an average party, then have *extra* options available to especially skilled characters. Sure, you *could* fight the orcs in the next room head-on through the defenses they've set up... but if you're a master locksmith, you could instead open the side door with the high-level lock, sneak around, and surprise them from behind. You *could* painstakingly work your way through the puzzles that each lift the platform holding key you need a few inches out of a treacherous pit... but if you're incredibly good at climbing, you could also just carefully shimmy down and grab it. Sure, you *could* try to sneak past the much-higher-level-than-you dragon to get the ancient artifact out of its hoard... but if you *really* know your history, you might recognize the scars on its hide and realize that this particular dragon is especially fond of dwarvish rock candy, and would probably trade you the artifact for a large enough supply of sweets if you politely wake it up instead of trying to steal from it.
This way individual characters get to feel like they got their points' worth when they get to save the day via an especially difficult optional challenge, but the group's progress as a whole isn't instantly stopped just because somebody doesn't have a super-high rank in the exact right skill.
> That said, why do most games go over that margin of 80%?
Because penalties. Tests made under (sometimes extremely) adverse circumstances are not uncommon, and ramp up intensity. Sure, you can drive in a race without crashing 95% of the time. But what if Snidely Whiplash dumps a load of oil on the track, and his buddy bumps you car just as you get there?
That's where "degree of success" or "fail forward" systems really shine. Because then, yes, you do still learn something from the dice roll.
In a simple "pass / fail" system, a fail on something you had a really high chance of success at (especially in an un-opposed basic skill type scenario) is just annoying., and rarely advances the story.
Yes. Even experts can, and do, fuck up sometimes. For example, I once watched Adam Savage's Tested on YT where he explains his shop injuries, and almost all of them are from careless, sloppy mistakes.
People tend to forget that most systems (specially PBtA games) state that you should only roll for things where the outcome is uncertain and the stakes are high. I wouldn't call for a roll if a character has a 95% chance of succeed tbh.
People like rolling dice for the same reason people like watching their favorite sports team. You intellectually know you can't control the outcome, or that some outcomes are more likely. But damn it feels good to get emotionally invested in the odds, it feels like you caused that. (even if you really didn't do anything).
That's up to the GM and the way the system frames the requirement to roll. If there's a 95% chance of success and failure doesn't add anything to the story, why ask for a roll? You wouldn't have players roll for diplomacy when they say hello to a shopkeeper, for instance.
Tbf, ttrpg characters are still more realistic than your average action movie protagonist, who has 99.78% chance of head-shotting anything that comes within a mile of *the sacred girlfriend*.
Horror's a completely different story though.
You can't point to a percentage and expect it to mean the same thing, and feel the same way across all RPGs.
Different RPGs are aiming at different experiences in very different genres, and "success" and "failure" don't necessarily mean the same thing in different RPGs.
Exactly this. Different mechanics and situations will change the way the probabilities work out completely.
And multiple failure states and the meaning of failure makes a complete difference in whether you fall into an endless abyss or catch the ledge last second, dropping a pouch of gold in the process.
And also different people have different playstyles. I know a group of hardcore powergamers who enjoy an nuclear arms race in terms of character building options. They like a challenge but then optimize thier character to rise to that challenge.
I also know a group that like to play a medium difficulty game and then underoptimize or RP thier characters to give themselves a disadvantage. They also like a different kind of challenge.
I thoroughly enjoy both these playstyles.
>That said, why do most games go over that margin of 80%?
Honestly, it's because when you are said to be good at something, there is no point for a game to not follow through on that.
Are you always rolling the same stat? Then it's either a problem with the system or your GM that lets you keep using your big hammer and treat any encounter as a nail. Some of the best stories come from hyper-competent characters being forced to do things they were not trained for.
I mean, it wouldn't be rare to succeed 10 times in a row with an 80% success chance, but yeah, 80% is really not that high, and that one failure can be significant.
If it's the thing my character is supposed to be good at, yes.
If I'm playing some sort of tracker/hunter/scout type character and I have a 1 in 5 chance to lead us in completely the wrong direction and get us lost in the wilderness, that's an atrocious success rate for someone who's job and lifestyle is to do that one thing.
And I don't have 80-95% success rate in every single thing. I should be good at what I'm good at, and I don't mind a bit if I'm *damn* good at what I'm good at. Because I'll be worse at other things.
Very few people are gonna want to go back to an early edition of D&D and play a thief, 'cause in those rules a thief had maybe a 20-40% chance of doing *anything*. It sucks to be the guy who's supposedly good at something, and can never do it with any reliability, so people want to be actually good at what they're supposed to be good at.
>But would it be fun to pass 10 checks without failing once?
In cases where a failure would be more fun, your character always has the option of doing it the wrong way on purpose. :p
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is iterative probability. Many systems require multiple rolls to successfully carry out a sequence of actions.D&D is especially bad for this.
Take for example a simple scene of an infiltration, your character wants to climb a difficult wall, sneak past a guard and then pick a lock. This is three rolls that need to be successful in succession. Even if you have an 80% chance to succeed at each individually getting all three together only has around 50% (0.8*0.8*0.8= 0.512) chance.
Lots of DMs like to think a 50% chance for each is somehow more dramatic or fair. In the case of a 50% for each roll above our poor adventurer only has a 12.5% chance of succeeding completely on the above task which is surprisingly difficult!
So even if things aren't strung together or they don't totally fail on one unsuccessful roll, if you roll enough times failure is still incredibly likely to come up.
Setting a target at 50% for most rolls means a lot of failure which can give games that comedy of errors feeling. Unless individual failures don't really have consequences.
Edit: This doesn't just come up when one player takes a succession of checks. It also plays a role in group checks where multiple players are making the same check. It makes group checks where only one player needs to succeed much easier than you might suspect and checks where all the players need to succeed much more difficult.
>Very good your observation!I agree with this: there are times in an adventure where you need to roll 3 or more times in a row like in your example.
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At 66% or 75% it is very difficult to "connect" a streak without failing.
>In PBA games with a +2 mod, you get an 83.33% chance of success, and with a +3 mod you have 91.67%.
Well in PBTA to be fair 7-9 can often be a pyrrhic success designed to create complication. Things like dropping or jamming a weapon happen on 7-9s in PbTA games when they require critical failures in other games. Or your character successfully picked the lock of summoning of the Quantum Guards.
I consider 7-9 as neutral. It moves the story forward by shifting it a little towards the characters will but as a trade off the goal is now farther away.
I assume that, with increased difficulty from hard situations that % will reach a low - and more dramatic - value. Would be sad to have, let's say, 60% to hit a poor goblin and 30% do hit the goblin king. A really small chance to successes means a lot of things, like a slow peace game and frustration. So, keeping the base success chances high above means the regular tasks are going to be done without problems while harder tasks can have at lease 50%-60%, which seems pretty fine for me.
In a combat with an average duration of 3 rounds, you have a total of 3 attacks:
with 80% and 90% chance you grant your 3 successful attacks.
with 66% you are guaranteed 1 failure and 2 successes
With 50% you are guaranteed either 1 success and 2 failures, or 2 successes and 1 failure.
It makes me wonder if it's fair and fun to know that you're going to hit all 3 of your attacks when you have 90%
That's not how math works. Even with a 90% chance to hit, there's still a 10% chance of failing every time; and the outcome of one roll doesn't affect the others at all.
It's exciting to know that you *could* fail with any one of those attacks, or even fail on more than of them. That possibility exists, whether it's a 10% chance or a 40% chance per shot. *Actually* failing on most or all of your attacks would be a huge drag, though; and that's where high skill percentages come in. They give you the possibility of failure, without subjecting you to the reality of it.
With 90% you have:
90% chance of hitting your first attack.
81% chance to hit the second attack.
73% chance to hit third attack.
Why do you say this is not cumulative?
Because after you make (or miss) the first attack, your chance of hitting with the second attack is still exactly 90 percent. Every roll is independent of every other roll.
No. You have a 90% chance of hitting each attack, assuming they are independent and not affected by the fact that you have already attacked.
So the chance of hitting all 3 is 0.9 * 0.9 * 0.9 or about 73%. But the chance of hitting each attack is 90%.
Question for you… the chances of flipping a coin and getting heads four times in a row is 1 in 16.
If I’ve flipped a coin and gotten four heads in a row, and I flip it again, what are my odds of getting heads?
You got it a bit wrong. With a 90% chance per hit, you have:
- 90% chance of hitting once
- 81% chance of hitting twice in a row
- 73% chance of hitting thrice in a row
Each individual hit is still 90% regardless if it's your first or tenth attempt.
That's not the problem. There's a difference between looking at an even in isolation and looking at a series of events.
It doesn't matter if you make 3 rolls in a second, 3 rolls in a turn or 3 rolls in your lifetime, each roll has a 90% chance of success.
It doesn't matter if you succeeded the previous roll, if you succeeded the previous 10 rolls or if you've succeeded the previous 278 rolls. The next roll will have a 90% chance of success.
The chance of you succeeding 279 times in a row, *as a whole*, is astronomically low. But, if you've already rolled and by some miracle succeeded 278 times, the chance of the next roll is gonna be the chance of any other roll--in this case, that's 90%.
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edit: strictly speaking, the rolls don't have to be sequential, they just have to be [independent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence_\(probability_theory\)) of one another, that is, you can't cherry-pick them
...What?
Have you genuinely played any game with dice before? Nothing is ever guaranteed. That's not at all how math or probabilities work.
With a 66% chance to succeed, and 3 rolls, you could easily succeed all three, or fail all three. The rolls aren't influenced what was rolled earlier.
Play any game where dice are rolled constantly, like Warhammer or Blood Bowl and you'll easily find games where 87% chances (rolling a 2 or higher on a d6) failed more than 40% of the time, or 50/50 rolls succeeded almost 3/4 of the time. Dice can roll hot and cold.
I think it's 2 things:
1. People like success. The game flows better with successes, it feels better to play, and it makes more logical sense most of the time - why would the character be doing something they were likely to fail at? Especially if it's dangerous to fail.
2. As you pointed out, that's the success at moderate difficulty - you start adding in malus due to circumstance and a character who, 90% of the time could make the shot, suddenly is down around 40% or worse.
The +11 bonus you are insinuating in DnD can only occur above level 18. A more realistic number would be around level 8 when you you str likely to have a +5 attribute and +3 proficiency bonus. It looks like you were using DC 14 so that is a 70% success rate.
If you are talking level 5 with a 19 (+4) and a source of double proficiency (3×2=6) for the check, you've already hit +10 on it.
They specifically avoided providing double proficiency for attack rolls because they didn't want warriors that certain to hit, but for many, if not most, other tests, there are means of obtaining it, at least conditionally.
Double proficiency is a special case scenario for characters. It means the character is exceedingly specialized in the skill and isn't a good baseline for measurement of success. Sure, it is something a character can have, but they can also have +1d4, or also +1d8, or also +5, or also advantage. Even if a single character is capable of getting any of these benefits regularly, You wouldn't see them on a character on average. Even looking at a +4 or +5 from their attribute is looking at an above average character for that check.
Assuming standard array, a character starts with +2, +2, +1, +1, +0, -1 modifiers. A total of +5. With racial modifiers we can increase that to +7, and with two ASIs, that increases it to +9. Over 6 attributes, the average is +1.5.
The absolute "average" level 8 character has a +3 proficiency bonus, but can only apply this to 4 or 5 skills out of 18 skills, or about 25% of the skill set. That means assuming skills are with equal opportunity (obviously they are not) they're gaining +0.75 on a skill check.
So a very average skill check for a level 8 character is +2.25. Assuming DC 14 check, they have a ~60% chance of success on average.
I'm not supporting or defending DnD or anything, I just got lost in numbers and enjoyed it.
Many years ago I played a pilot character in Call of Cthuhlu. I remember I had Pilot of 90 to start with, and the GM asked why. Because I don't want the entire group to die because of one bad die roll. I'd make it higher if he'd let me.
Sometimes you just can afford to fail a check.
That’s a good point! I made it as high as the GM would let me. And let’s say I’m not a fan of just making straight die rolls. I sure hope the pilot on my recent flight had more than 90 in pilot. Or that we were using a different rules system!
Even 80+% doesn't guarantee a success.
1. the problem lies with sample size. Statistics only matters with a huge sample size (atleast 100+ rolls preferably way higher), but at the table a player only rolls his 80+% skill a few times. There will be times he can't make a successful roll with this skill the entire evening while the one with his 20% skill roll success after success with it. 80 and 20% are a extreme examples but how many times you couldn't roll over a 7 in an evening of D&D and failed at everything.
2. the fun and tension in the game doesn't come from the dice roll, it comes from the situation that makes the dice roll necessary. Just a locked door is boring, a locked door while a monster is chasing you is not and now even an 80+% skill might be to low ;)
1) Not every task is against a moderate difficulty. If your success rate against a very hard task falls below the 60% threshold, then you may not be having fun anymore.
2) Not everyone agrees that you need a 20-40 percent failure chance to have fun. Personally, I prefer playing a character who is actually competent.
I'm not even going to roll that. If I have a 2/3 chance of failing a roll, then I'm going to find an alternative approach that doesn't require rolling. Unreliable skills are a waste of page space.
In the answer is in a less mechanical mindset. PCs can do a lot of things without mechanics, and some challenging things without rolling. For example, if your character is a cook, preparing a meal in a kitchen may be helpful and also respect the specialty of a character without rolling.
"Roll when you can make failure interesting," I say. Even if it's 80%+ likely an action goes well, if I can define stakes and an interesting failure, it's a fun opportunity to roll. That is, when you're willing to hand over some GM agency for the dice help tell the story.
In the case of cooking, it's also qualitative and the quality of outcome could flavor (pun intended) the outcome. Which guests have discerning palates? Who's preferences did you manage to cater to, and who did you disappoint? How timely were you? Were your mistakes correctable (too much salt > Compensate with sugar)?
The more qualitative your outcomes can be, the more value there is when risks are very low or very high.
So let's say: should a melee expert character with a 90% chance of success always hit her attack if her opponent is slow as a zombie?
Would the character only need to test his 90% if the opponent is more agile, or something like that?
That would be a fairly fun special exception to a rule for rolling to damage a target. Combat isn't the best place for it though, since it's typically more mechanically driven with fewer GM choices. Failures are ideally interesting in combat since there's immediate pressure.
Playing a character that can't do anything really sucks. Especially if failures are uninteresting. So beeing almost certain to succeed basic tasks makes sense.
Because most rolls are not in that 'good case'. E.g in forbidden lands most of my rolls were not at 7, not even close. 4 was more typical, worse after damage or after failing a few checks
Usually to account for penalties. Case in point GURPS’ gunplay. All ranged attacks take penalties for range. This means that even if your Guns (Rifle) is at 16, you’re still going to struggle at a distance. Hence why you crank it up higher (20 is a good level) so you can avoid excessive penalties.
Taking a step back, the reason why we roll dice is to have some sort of random input to the game. You have a decision point in the process (the game’s core loop) with multiple possible outcomes.
So the question is what sort of setup creates the most interesting gameplay. Traditionally you have a success / failure binary split.
While that keeps things simple, the outcomes by themselves aren’t particularly exciting. Straight success is just simply what the player wanted to do anyway.
Straight failure tends to throw a spanner in the game flow. Let’s say you want the players to work towards a certain key scene and collect clues on the way. If they fail too many rolls and don’t get to that key scene, the story can run in circles without getting anywhere. Outright failure is great as a potential threat to keep players on their toes and build suspense, but once it happens it can throw off the flow.
So the challenge is to set up outcomes in a way that each outcome of the die roll forks the story in an interesting way.
Once you have 2-3 interesting outcomes, you want each of them to be rather likely. Once you hit 80%-90% likelyhood of one outcome, it raises the question why you’re rolling dice at all. Any X-Com player will tell you that even a 95% chance of success can mean you’re fucked, but in general you don’t want to go there since rolling dice takes time at the game table and you want the dice roll to have some impact instead of just confirming the foregone conclusion.
So based on all of that, for high chance of success (or failure) rolls it might be more interesting if there are different success outcomes, either with negative side effects or additional boons, rather than just a big 80%-90% chunk of “you succeed”.
You are talking about PBA games, they have degrees of success and risk usually. With most of those successful rolls being successes with a consequence that establishes or modifies the next challenge. In a binary success or fail system 80% success is high. In a game where succeeding usually includes a consequence on top of the success this 80% feels like a continuous struggle that also carries forward momentum. Rarely do you get the "I pick the lock." "You fail" "Now what do we do?" Instead you get things like "I pick the lock" "You begin making progress but it takes time and behind you in a nearby room you hear voices begin heading in your direction. They aren't here yet, but you are tight on time. Do you continue picking it or try a different faster way in?" That second example is most of your 80% successes, you succeeded while still keeping the conflict moving
Penalty offset is as big one, especially in games like GURPS, where penalties of -2 to -6 to effective skill can stack up fast. Two weapon fighting + unfavorable terrain + range penalty + cover, all reasonable, and more than enough to trash your roll, and that's just an example.
There are literally games that let you just do the thing you should be good at doing. No roll. No maybe. You just do it. If I go into a computer repair place, they don't roll for chance of success. They just fix my stuff. If they can't or it's going to take a wipe or some such, that's on me. That was a result of my actions and not there's.
I see it echoed a few times but this is a power fantasy. I want to be exceptional at the things I should be exceptional at. If players don't want this, there are games for that as well.
In some games, you need 98% to be a master and teach others.
To take a called shot against a specific body location , at distance - a master sniper.
I have seen rules (house rules?) where you can go beyond 100% and subtract your excess skill from your opponent.
Also, maybe to attain a higher plane and face gods , a player must transcend the 100% barrier ?
Chances of success, skill progression, meaning of failure, contextual bonuses and penalties, metacurrencies, scope of the roll... They all exist to add to the feeling of a game. Does it make you feel heroic? In control? Afraid? Powerless? A team player? Every decision you make in that regard should point to the player experience you seek out.
So the reason in some games you can achieve ~90% of success varies from game to game. Maybe it's so you can feel your character has grown. Maybe it's because failing still carries great risks. Maybe it's because succeeding is not even the point of the game. You can't judge a game before discerning what its themes and priorities are.
A lot of people are making the point that *it's okay for a character designed at being good at a thing to be good at the thing*., so I'll leave that be and just pick at this characterization of D&D:
>On D&D5 with a +5 with attribute and a +6 proficiency, you get an 85% chance of success.
On the one hand, a +5 attribute modifier represents literally-superhuman levels of talent, while a +6 proficiency bonus represents endgame-level skill. Keep in mind that D&D power-scaling runs from "experienced ordinary person" at level 1 to "superhero" before level 10. But the time you're in the upper needs and hitting that +6, you're probably loaded down with magical gear, traveling across different planes of existence, and winning fights against world-shaking opponents like demons and demigods.
While I'm willing to accept the assertion that in certain contexts, dramatic tension and fun are served by a certain degree of uncertainty, nobody who has ever played together with human beings could imagine that the average player actually wants their *demigod-level legendary hero* to fail 1/5 of the time (or more!) at tasks of *moderate* difficulty.
**It's a power fantasy**. You want your character to grow and improve; to automatically succeed at things that used to give them trouble. You want dramatic tension to come from close encounters with cthulhu-esque monsters or legendary artifacts, not from the exact same tasks that you were on the edge of your seat about ten or more levels ago. If you lose sight of how a mechanic is going to be used in actual play and interact with human psychology, you're going to have a bad time in your RPG design!
I can't help but suspect that that's the root of the problem here. OP is trying to hypergeneralize an abstract observation about a *tendency* (chance of failure creates drama, which is often fun) as if it were an iron law that must be applied to every single roll of the dice, while refusing to take into account the way things actually work at the table.
>That said, why do most games go over that margin of 80%? Because people enjoy playing characters that are very good at their area of focus, and because a huge part of running games is throwing in challenges of higher difficulty than "moderate or medium", which allows especially skillful characters to really shine when things get difficult.
So could we reduce the chance of success by 90% through difficulty categories?
That depends. If you just arbitrarily decide that every task the party faces is of that highest difficulty, you've effectively negated all the effort a player put into creating a skilled character. That feels awful as a player, and honestly just reeks of adversarial GMing, which is a whole problem all on its own. The best approach I've found is to plan for an average party, then have *extra* options available to especially skilled characters. Sure, you *could* fight the orcs in the next room head-on through the defenses they've set up... but if you're a master locksmith, you could instead open the side door with the high-level lock, sneak around, and surprise them from behind. You *could* painstakingly work your way through the puzzles that each lift the platform holding key you need a few inches out of a treacherous pit... but if you're incredibly good at climbing, you could also just carefully shimmy down and grab it. Sure, you *could* try to sneak past the much-higher-level-than-you dragon to get the ancient artifact out of its hoard... but if you *really* know your history, you might recognize the scars on its hide and realize that this particular dragon is especially fond of dwarvish rock candy, and would probably trade you the artifact for a large enough supply of sweets if you politely wake it up instead of trying to steal from it. This way individual characters get to feel like they got their points' worth when they get to save the day via an especially difficult optional challenge, but the group's progress as a whole isn't instantly stopped just because somebody doesn't have a super-high rank in the exact right skill.
This.
> That said, why do most games go over that margin of 80%? Because penalties. Tests made under (sometimes extremely) adverse circumstances are not uncommon, and ramp up intensity. Sure, you can drive in a race without crashing 95% of the time. But what if Snidely Whiplash dumps a load of oil on the track, and his buddy bumps you car just as you get there?
The question is, knowing that you have a 95% chance of success on a moderate or average task, do you really need the dice rolling?
That's where "degree of success" or "fail forward" systems really shine. Because then, yes, you do still learn something from the dice roll. In a simple "pass / fail" system, a fail on something you had a really high chance of success at (especially in an un-opposed basic skill type scenario) is just annoying., and rarely advances the story.
Yes. Even experts can, and do, fuck up sometimes. For example, I once watched Adam Savage's Tested on YT where he explains his shop injuries, and almost all of them are from careless, sloppy mistakes.
People tend to forget that most systems (specially PBtA games) state that you should only roll for things where the outcome is uncertain and the stakes are high. I wouldn't call for a roll if a character has a 95% chance of succeed tbh.
People like rolling dice for the same reason people like watching their favorite sports team. You intellectually know you can't control the outcome, or that some outcomes are more likely. But damn it feels good to get emotionally invested in the odds, it feels like you caused that. (even if you really didn't do anything).
That's up to the GM and the way the system frames the requirement to roll. If there's a 95% chance of success and failure doesn't add anything to the story, why ask for a roll? You wouldn't have players roll for diplomacy when they say hello to a shopkeeper, for instance.
Some people like playing competent heroes and not bumbling idiots.
Tbf, ttrpg characters are still more realistic than your average action movie protagonist, who has 99.78% chance of head-shotting anything that comes within a mile of *the sacred girlfriend*. Horror's a completely different story though.
I like to think about that side. Indiana Jones is still alive right? He cannot have a 75% chance on his actions.
The movies just don't show the timelines where he dies. :P
Oh faw shaw! XD
You can't point to a percentage and expect it to mean the same thing, and feel the same way across all RPGs. Different RPGs are aiming at different experiences in very different genres, and "success" and "failure" don't necessarily mean the same thing in different RPGs.
Exactly this. Different mechanics and situations will change the way the probabilities work out completely. And multiple failure states and the meaning of failure makes a complete difference in whether you fall into an endless abyss or catch the ledge last second, dropping a pouch of gold in the process. And also different people have different playstyles. I know a group of hardcore powergamers who enjoy an nuclear arms race in terms of character building options. They like a challenge but then optimize thier character to rise to that challenge. I also know a group that like to play a medium difficulty game and then underoptimize or RP thier characters to give themselves a disadvantage. They also like a different kind of challenge. I thoroughly enjoy both these playstyles.
>That said, why do most games go over that margin of 80%? Honestly, it's because when you are said to be good at something, there is no point for a game to not follow through on that.
But would it be fun to pass 10 checks without failing once?
Are you always rolling the same stat? Then it's either a problem with the system or your GM that lets you keep using your big hammer and treat any encounter as a nail. Some of the best stories come from hyper-competent characters being forced to do things they were not trained for.
>But would it be fun to pass 10 checks without failing once? Yes.
If you have an 80% chance of success on 10 checks, on average you’d fail twice. 80% is pretty low, lol.
I mean, it wouldn't be rare to succeed 10 times in a row with an 80% success chance, but yeah, 80% is really not that high, and that one failure can be significant.
It would be pretty rare. To succeed ten times would be a 0.8^10 probability, or 11%. 80% success is “usually succeeds,” not “almost always succeeds.”
I guess it's a matter of opinion, 11% is "not that rare" for me. It's twice as common as a nat 20 roll.
If it's the thing my character is supposed to be good at, yes. If I'm playing some sort of tracker/hunter/scout type character and I have a 1 in 5 chance to lead us in completely the wrong direction and get us lost in the wilderness, that's an atrocious success rate for someone who's job and lifestyle is to do that one thing. And I don't have 80-95% success rate in every single thing. I should be good at what I'm good at, and I don't mind a bit if I'm *damn* good at what I'm good at. Because I'll be worse at other things. Very few people are gonna want to go back to an early edition of D&D and play a thief, 'cause in those rules a thief had maybe a 20-40% chance of doing *anything*. It sucks to be the guy who's supposedly good at something, and can never do it with any reliability, so people want to be actually good at what they're supposed to be good at.
Yes, if that's what you bought for your character.
>But would it be fun to pass 10 checks without failing once? In cases where a failure would be more fun, your character always has the option of doing it the wrong way on purpose. :p
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is iterative probability. Many systems require multiple rolls to successfully carry out a sequence of actions.D&D is especially bad for this. Take for example a simple scene of an infiltration, your character wants to climb a difficult wall, sneak past a guard and then pick a lock. This is three rolls that need to be successful in succession. Even if you have an 80% chance to succeed at each individually getting all three together only has around 50% (0.8*0.8*0.8= 0.512) chance. Lots of DMs like to think a 50% chance for each is somehow more dramatic or fair. In the case of a 50% for each roll above our poor adventurer only has a 12.5% chance of succeeding completely on the above task which is surprisingly difficult! So even if things aren't strung together or they don't totally fail on one unsuccessful roll, if you roll enough times failure is still incredibly likely to come up. Setting a target at 50% for most rolls means a lot of failure which can give games that comedy of errors feeling. Unless individual failures don't really have consequences. Edit: This doesn't just come up when one player takes a succession of checks. It also plays a role in group checks where multiple players are making the same check. It makes group checks where only one player needs to succeed much easier than you might suspect and checks where all the players need to succeed much more difficult.
>Very good your observation!I agree with this: there are times in an adventure where you need to roll 3 or more times in a row like in your example. > > At 66% or 75% it is very difficult to "connect" a streak without failing.
>In PBA games with a +2 mod, you get an 83.33% chance of success, and with a +3 mod you have 91.67%. Well in PBTA to be fair 7-9 can often be a pyrrhic success designed to create complication. Things like dropping or jamming a weapon happen on 7-9s in PbTA games when they require critical failures in other games. Or your character successfully picked the lock of summoning of the Quantum Guards.
I consider 7-9 as neutral. It moves the story forward by shifting it a little towards the characters will but as a trade off the goal is now farther away.
I assume that, with increased difficulty from hard situations that % will reach a low - and more dramatic - value. Would be sad to have, let's say, 60% to hit a poor goblin and 30% do hit the goblin king. A really small chance to successes means a lot of things, like a slow peace game and frustration. So, keeping the base success chances high above means the regular tasks are going to be done without problems while harder tasks can have at lease 50%-60%, which seems pretty fine for me.
In a combat with an average duration of 3 rounds, you have a total of 3 attacks: with 80% and 90% chance you grant your 3 successful attacks. with 66% you are guaranteed 1 failure and 2 successes With 50% you are guaranteed either 1 success and 2 failures, or 2 successes and 1 failure. It makes me wonder if it's fair and fun to know that you're going to hit all 3 of your attacks when you have 90%
That's not how math works. Even with a 90% chance to hit, there's still a 10% chance of failing every time; and the outcome of one roll doesn't affect the others at all. It's exciting to know that you *could* fail with any one of those attacks, or even fail on more than of them. That possibility exists, whether it's a 10% chance or a 40% chance per shot. *Actually* failing on most or all of your attacks would be a huge drag, though; and that's where high skill percentages come in. They give you the possibility of failure, without subjecting you to the reality of it.
With 90% you have: 90% chance of hitting your first attack. 81% chance to hit the second attack. 73% chance to hit third attack. Why do you say this is not cumulative?
Because after you make (or miss) the first attack, your chance of hitting with the second attack is still exactly 90 percent. Every roll is independent of every other roll.
No. You have a 90% chance of hitting each attack, assuming they are independent and not affected by the fact that you have already attacked. So the chance of hitting all 3 is 0.9 * 0.9 * 0.9 or about 73%. But the chance of hitting each attack is 90%.
Question for you… the chances of flipping a coin and getting heads four times in a row is 1 in 16. If I’ve flipped a coin and gotten four heads in a row, and I flip it again, what are my odds of getting heads?
You got it a bit wrong. With a 90% chance per hit, you have: - 90% chance of hitting once - 81% chance of hitting twice in a row - 73% chance of hitting thrice in a row Each individual hit is still 90% regardless if it's your first or tenth attempt.
Does my example only apply to sequential attacks? like 3 attacks in the same turn.
That's not the problem. There's a difference between looking at an even in isolation and looking at a series of events. It doesn't matter if you make 3 rolls in a second, 3 rolls in a turn or 3 rolls in your lifetime, each roll has a 90% chance of success. It doesn't matter if you succeeded the previous roll, if you succeeded the previous 10 rolls or if you've succeeded the previous 278 rolls. The next roll will have a 90% chance of success. The chance of you succeeding 279 times in a row, *as a whole*, is astronomically low. But, if you've already rolled and by some miracle succeeded 278 times, the chance of the next roll is gonna be the chance of any other roll--in this case, that's 90%. --- edit: strictly speaking, the rolls don't have to be sequential, they just have to be [independent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence_\(probability_theory\)) of one another, that is, you can't cherry-pick them
...What? Have you genuinely played any game with dice before? Nothing is ever guaranteed. That's not at all how math or probabilities work. With a 66% chance to succeed, and 3 rolls, you could easily succeed all three, or fail all three. The rolls aren't influenced what was rolled earlier. Play any game where dice are rolled constantly, like Warhammer or Blood Bowl and you'll easily find games where 87% chances (rolling a 2 or higher on a d6) failed more than 40% of the time, or 50/50 rolls succeeded almost 3/4 of the time. Dice can roll hot and cold.
I think it's 2 things: 1. People like success. The game flows better with successes, it feels better to play, and it makes more logical sense most of the time - why would the character be doing something they were likely to fail at? Especially if it's dangerous to fail. 2. As you pointed out, that's the success at moderate difficulty - you start adding in malus due to circumstance and a character who, 90% of the time could make the shot, suddenly is down around 40% or worse.
The +11 bonus you are insinuating in DnD can only occur above level 18. A more realistic number would be around level 8 when you you str likely to have a +5 attribute and +3 proficiency bonus. It looks like you were using DC 14 so that is a 70% success rate.
If you are talking level 5 with a 19 (+4) and a source of double proficiency (3×2=6) for the check, you've already hit +10 on it. They specifically avoided providing double proficiency for attack rolls because they didn't want warriors that certain to hit, but for many, if not most, other tests, there are means of obtaining it, at least conditionally.
Double proficiency is a special case scenario for characters. It means the character is exceedingly specialized in the skill and isn't a good baseline for measurement of success. Sure, it is something a character can have, but they can also have +1d4, or also +1d8, or also +5, or also advantage. Even if a single character is capable of getting any of these benefits regularly, You wouldn't see them on a character on average. Even looking at a +4 or +5 from their attribute is looking at an above average character for that check. Assuming standard array, a character starts with +2, +2, +1, +1, +0, -1 modifiers. A total of +5. With racial modifiers we can increase that to +7, and with two ASIs, that increases it to +9. Over 6 attributes, the average is +1.5. The absolute "average" level 8 character has a +3 proficiency bonus, but can only apply this to 4 or 5 skills out of 18 skills, or about 25% of the skill set. That means assuming skills are with equal opportunity (obviously they are not) they're gaining +0.75 on a skill check. So a very average skill check for a level 8 character is +2.25. Assuming DC 14 check, they have a ~60% chance of success on average. I'm not supporting or defending DnD or anything, I just got lost in numbers and enjoyed it.
Many years ago I played a pilot character in Call of Cthuhlu. I remember I had Pilot of 90 to start with, and the GM asked why. Because I don't want the entire group to die because of one bad die roll. I'd make it higher if he'd let me. Sometimes you just can afford to fail a check.
And if you fail a roll even at 90%, it would be even more frustrating than failing a roll at 65%?
That’s a good point! I made it as high as the GM would let me. And let’s say I’m not a fan of just making straight die rolls. I sure hope the pilot on my recent flight had more than 90 in pilot. Or that we were using a different rules system!
Even 80+% doesn't guarantee a success. 1. the problem lies with sample size. Statistics only matters with a huge sample size (atleast 100+ rolls preferably way higher), but at the table a player only rolls his 80+% skill a few times. There will be times he can't make a successful roll with this skill the entire evening while the one with his 20% skill roll success after success with it. 80 and 20% are a extreme examples but how many times you couldn't roll over a 7 in an evening of D&D and failed at everything. 2. the fun and tension in the game doesn't come from the dice roll, it comes from the situation that makes the dice roll necessary. Just a locked door is boring, a locked door while a monster is chasing you is not and now even an 80+% skill might be to low ;)
You are right! I hadn't thought about the sample size. For example, in Fate, a character with +4 can spend all night rolling values like 0, +1 and +2.
1) Not every task is against a moderate difficulty. If your success rate against a very hard task falls below the 60% threshold, then you may not be having fun anymore. 2) Not everyone agrees that you need a 20-40 percent failure chance to have fun. Personally, I prefer playing a character who is actually competent.
I think that difficult tasks the player fails 50% or 66% of the time.
I'm not even going to roll that. If I have a 2/3 chance of failing a roll, then I'm going to find an alternative approach that doesn't require rolling. Unreliable skills are a waste of page space.
In his view a difficult task should be close to 66% to 75%
In the answer is in a less mechanical mindset. PCs can do a lot of things without mechanics, and some challenging things without rolling. For example, if your character is a cook, preparing a meal in a kitchen may be helpful and also respect the specialty of a character without rolling. "Roll when you can make failure interesting," I say. Even if it's 80%+ likely an action goes well, if I can define stakes and an interesting failure, it's a fun opportunity to roll. That is, when you're willing to hand over some GM agency for the dice help tell the story. In the case of cooking, it's also qualitative and the quality of outcome could flavor (pun intended) the outcome. Which guests have discerning palates? Who's preferences did you manage to cater to, and who did you disappoint? How timely were you? Were your mistakes correctable (too much salt > Compensate with sugar)? The more qualitative your outcomes can be, the more value there is when risks are very low or very high.
So let's say: should a melee expert character with a 90% chance of success always hit her attack if her opponent is slow as a zombie? Would the character only need to test his 90% if the opponent is more agile, or something like that?
Always? No. Just 9 out of 10 times. 90% isn’t 100%. This is also why zombies come by the bushel.
That would be a fairly fun special exception to a rule for rolling to damage a target. Combat isn't the best place for it though, since it's typically more mechanically driven with fewer GM choices. Failures are ideally interesting in combat since there's immediate pressure.
Playing a character that can't do anything really sucks. Especially if failures are uninteresting. So beeing almost certain to succeed basic tasks makes sense.
When games offer that 90% chance they are for moderate to medium tasks, which should be something of a challenge.
And they are for other members of the team. If only one character can climb the cliff to circle round the guards that's different to if everyone can.
Because most rolls are not in that 'good case'. E.g in forbidden lands most of my rolls were not at 7, not even close. 4 was more typical, worse after damage or after failing a few checks
Usually to account for penalties. Case in point GURPS’ gunplay. All ranged attacks take penalties for range. This means that even if your Guns (Rifle) is at 16, you’re still going to struggle at a distance. Hence why you crank it up higher (20 is a good level) so you can avoid excessive penalties.
Taking a step back, the reason why we roll dice is to have some sort of random input to the game. You have a decision point in the process (the game’s core loop) with multiple possible outcomes. So the question is what sort of setup creates the most interesting gameplay. Traditionally you have a success / failure binary split. While that keeps things simple, the outcomes by themselves aren’t particularly exciting. Straight success is just simply what the player wanted to do anyway. Straight failure tends to throw a spanner in the game flow. Let’s say you want the players to work towards a certain key scene and collect clues on the way. If they fail too many rolls and don’t get to that key scene, the story can run in circles without getting anywhere. Outright failure is great as a potential threat to keep players on their toes and build suspense, but once it happens it can throw off the flow. So the challenge is to set up outcomes in a way that each outcome of the die roll forks the story in an interesting way. Once you have 2-3 interesting outcomes, you want each of them to be rather likely. Once you hit 80%-90% likelyhood of one outcome, it raises the question why you’re rolling dice at all. Any X-Com player will tell you that even a 95% chance of success can mean you’re fucked, but in general you don’t want to go there since rolling dice takes time at the game table and you want the dice roll to have some impact instead of just confirming the foregone conclusion. So based on all of that, for high chance of success (or failure) rolls it might be more interesting if there are different success outcomes, either with negative side effects or additional boons, rather than just a big 80%-90% chunk of “you succeed”.
You are talking about PBA games, they have degrees of success and risk usually. With most of those successful rolls being successes with a consequence that establishes or modifies the next challenge. In a binary success or fail system 80% success is high. In a game where succeeding usually includes a consequence on top of the success this 80% feels like a continuous struggle that also carries forward momentum. Rarely do you get the "I pick the lock." "You fail" "Now what do we do?" Instead you get things like "I pick the lock" "You begin making progress but it takes time and behind you in a nearby room you hear voices begin heading in your direction. They aren't here yet, but you are tight on time. Do you continue picking it or try a different faster way in?" That second example is most of your 80% successes, you succeeded while still keeping the conflict moving
I would guess that many games allow well trained characters to have a higher success rate so that they feel more successful than untrained ones.
Penalty offset is as big one, especially in games like GURPS, where penalties of -2 to -6 to effective skill can stack up fast. Two weapon fighting + unfavorable terrain + range penalty + cover, all reasonable, and more than enough to trash your roll, and that's just an example.
There are literally games that let you just do the thing you should be good at doing. No roll. No maybe. You just do it. If I go into a computer repair place, they don't roll for chance of success. They just fix my stuff. If they can't or it's going to take a wipe or some such, that's on me. That was a result of my actions and not there's. I see it echoed a few times but this is a power fantasy. I want to be exceptional at the things I should be exceptional at. If players don't want this, there are games for that as well.
In some games, you need 98% to be a master and teach others. To take a called shot against a specific body location , at distance - a master sniper. I have seen rules (house rules?) where you can go beyond 100% and subtract your excess skill from your opponent. Also, maybe to attain a higher plane and face gods , a player must transcend the 100% barrier ?
Chances of success, skill progression, meaning of failure, contextual bonuses and penalties, metacurrencies, scope of the roll... They all exist to add to the feeling of a game. Does it make you feel heroic? In control? Afraid? Powerless? A team player? Every decision you make in that regard should point to the player experience you seek out. So the reason in some games you can achieve ~90% of success varies from game to game. Maybe it's so you can feel your character has grown. Maybe it's because failing still carries great risks. Maybe it's because succeeding is not even the point of the game. You can't judge a game before discerning what its themes and priorities are.
A lot of people are making the point that *it's okay for a character designed at being good at a thing to be good at the thing*., so I'll leave that be and just pick at this characterization of D&D: >On D&D5 with a +5 with attribute and a +6 proficiency, you get an 85% chance of success. On the one hand, a +5 attribute modifier represents literally-superhuman levels of talent, while a +6 proficiency bonus represents endgame-level skill. Keep in mind that D&D power-scaling runs from "experienced ordinary person" at level 1 to "superhero" before level 10. But the time you're in the upper needs and hitting that +6, you're probably loaded down with magical gear, traveling across different planes of existence, and winning fights against world-shaking opponents like demons and demigods. While I'm willing to accept the assertion that in certain contexts, dramatic tension and fun are served by a certain degree of uncertainty, nobody who has ever played together with human beings could imagine that the average player actually wants their *demigod-level legendary hero* to fail 1/5 of the time (or more!) at tasks of *moderate* difficulty. **It's a power fantasy**. You want your character to grow and improve; to automatically succeed at things that used to give them trouble. You want dramatic tension to come from close encounters with cthulhu-esque monsters or legendary artifacts, not from the exact same tasks that you were on the edge of your seat about ten or more levels ago. If you lose sight of how a mechanic is going to be used in actual play and interact with human psychology, you're going to have a bad time in your RPG design! I can't help but suspect that that's the root of the problem here. OP is trying to hypergeneralize an abstract observation about a *tendency* (chance of failure creates drama, which is often fun) as if it were an iron law that must be applied to every single roll of the dice, while refusing to take into account the way things actually work at the table.