[Elfs] When to roll?

[p.czigany]

Hi there!

When should the elf players roll their 3d10 in the game Elfs?
The book says whenever the task is "at least possible". Does this mean there is no player initiated player character action w/o rolling the dice? (Although the person rolling doesn't have to be the same as the acting one -- in the case of elf on elf action.)
A completely different approach--much like Sorcerer--could be that the stated action has to be dangerous and/or hard, etc. in the GM's opinion in order to be dice-dependent?
Is either of the above two the intended procedure or a third version which I had left out?
Best,

Peter

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Peter, and welcome to the forum.

Your question is a good one, but it arises from dialogues and concepts that were developed well after Elfs was designed and published. Since I can apply my long-ago intentions and the way I "know" how to play Elfs to the text, I can see what it tries to explain or simply fails to explain. But textually, the answers simply aren't there, and I'm not pretending they are.

Here's what "when a task is at least possible" means in modern terms: it means what Vincent carefully outlines in Apocalypse World, putting the two following concepts together.

1. If a player or GM describes an event or an attempted action in purely fictional terms, then the game mechanics (numbers, rolling dice) must be employed and the mechanical results constrain what we then say happens.

2. If a player or GM utilizes the game mechanics (numbers, rolling dice) in eligible moments of play, then fictional events or attempted actions must be either spoken or assumed to be spoken, to correspond to them.

Therefore neither "saying without rolling" or "rolling without saying" ever happen. Even if one rolls with little or no description, the corresponding fiction is assumed to be occurring, and may be retroactively fitted in while narrating the results.

So, to bring it to Elfs, it's easy: equate "action" to rolling dice, and vice versa. In this case, I don't mean "action" in the RPG sense of a deliberate task attempt, but in the colloquial sense usually applied to stories, as in, "let's have some action!" or "and the action begins!"

Let me know if any of this helps or makes sense.

Best, Ron