Helping dice

[museleading]

Ran a conflict last night and a rule question came up.  Someone wanted to raise by shooting (and killing) a demon with a bullet soaked in the blood of a Dog.  Another player wanted to say a blessing over the bullet.

So I had one player shooting a gun, one offering a blood soaked bullet and one blessing the bullet.  Three players contributing to one raise.

In terms of system mechanics, how should this run?  I said at the time that the player shooting the gun should provide two dice for the raise and the other two could add one dice each.  Which meant I was trying to block 35.  I had to take the blow, there was no way I could block or see numbers like that.

The rules aren't too clear on how helping each other works offensively, just how the fallout system works.

Anyone have an opinion on how to run this type of situation mechanically?

[Darren Hill]

First, a question: was the conflict about defeating the demon?
If so, then no matter what, a raise to kill the demon can not succeed. You need to raise with something less than that (shooting it is fine). You cannot make a raise that would, if successful, resolve the conflict. That's trying to bypass the rules about how conflicts are resolved.

Assuming that's not the case, here's how I would have done it:

The person firing the gun does his raise as normal.
The person blessing the bullet does that action As A Raise of its own - which the demon has to See normally. It's probably best to do this blessing raise first, before the shooting, but you could also do it is a momentary flashback: after the shooter shoots and the demon sees with, "but the bullet is mundane and does not harm me," or whatever, the next character raises with, "but just before he fired, I blessed the bullet..."

As regards the more general question of Helping, the rules do include a helping mechanic, and Vincent has recommended a second method on these forums.

1: Helping Rule - a player can lend another character a die, but it comes out of his next raise or see.  The rulebook has more detail.

2: The other method: treat the helping character as furniture or belongings. If a character offers help, decide if he's Crap, Ordinary, Big, Excellent or Big and Excellent for this purpose, and give those dice. I don't recommend allow this if the person helping is already in the conflict and has his own dice.

[lumpley]

Hey Museleading (I feel like I should know your name, but maybe I don't?) - you played it right, by the book. The two helping players contribute a die each to the raise, and lose a die from their next raise. Save a big die if you can, to reverse those raises when they come, but if you can't save a big die, you're done.

Three Dogs acting together will beat anybody.

-Vincent

[museleading]

First, a question: was the conflict about defeating the demon?

You guessed right.  The stakes were "Does Br David escape?"  At the time of the raise, Br David was flying about the church on demon wings, so killing the demon wouldn't have resolved the stakes.

Assuming that's not the case, here's how I would have done it:

This was one of the ways I was thinking of, but I don't understand how that would work from a story POV.  Why would the demon see the blessing only to take the blow on the bullet?  They were all part of the same parcel to my way of thinking...

Can you explain your reasoning a little more?

As regards the more general question of Helping, the rules do include a helping mechanic, and Vincent has recommended a second method on these forums.

Thanks for those.

[museleading]

Hey Museleading (I feel like I should know your name, but maybe I don't?) - you played it right, by the book. The two helping players contribute a die each to the raise, and lose a die from their next raise. Save a big die if you can, to reverse those raises when they come, but if you can't save a big die, you're done.

Three Dogs acting together will beat anybody.

Hey Vincent,

While we haven't actually met, most of my posts here are to do with Dogs (it being the system I am playing around with atm).

*wave* To introduce myself (all be it a little late), I'm an Aussie.  I've been roleplaying for a while now, but have always preferred systemless games.  To my surprise I find myself seriously enjoying Dogs – the system as well as the story elements. 

Back on the topic at hand – I get that as GM I rarely win conflicts.  I had thought the main GM focus was to push the heat up, find out just how much the chrs care about a particular conflict.

Having to see a 35 wipes a lot of dice out of my hand.  At the same time, the players have no downside to making me hand over that many dice in one go. But at the same time, that particular set of events I saw as one package, breaking them down didn't make sense.

To my way of thinking, if we had done the conflict in a number of raises and sees, I would have had the opportunity to offer them the question of taking blows or giving.  Cause it was such a high number, the conflict was over that round.  Is that what you intend?  If so, I think I may have misunderstood the GM purpose in conflicts, can you explain it?

[lumpley]

In addition to that, the GM's job is also to give just as soon as the conflict's over, no matter how many dice are left on the table. Don't even take the blow, just give. Was there some circumstance going that required that to be the final conflict with this guy? Maybe there was, I wasn't there, but my experience is that the players really like it when they crush you so you're forced to throw a curve at them.

So, give and remember the cutting your losses rule. Launch a followup, which doesn't have to be (and shouldn't be) that guy vs. everybody! Make it personal. The other Dogs can come in as improvised things.

"I give, he doesn't get away. Who reaches him first? Brother Mitch? Okay, when you put your hands on him, he spins around and glares into your eyes and his eyes are like FIRE and what's at stake is, does the demon possess you instead?"

-Vincent

[museleading]

got it - thanks

[Yokiboy]

Wow, Helping is all kinds of powerful - as I guess it should be - in Dogs. I have not encountered it to this magnitude yet in my own game.

Not that it applies directly to your question museleading, but the Helping option in The Princes' Kingdom works as an awesome addition to Dogs. I will add it to our current Dogs campaign to see how it plays out.

Oh, and helping each other can happen, too, which is neat. You can always give some of your dice to someone else to help them out in a see. If they see with three or more dice, they don’t take the blow. You do instead!

I think I prefer Helping with Sees rather than Raises, it does change the feel of the game somewhat, and in a way I enjoy.

TTFN,

Yoki

[Yokiboy]

Just to be clear, I'm aware that you can Help with Sees in Dogs too, but not with as many dice as you want, just one.

When you give a die to a friend for a See, it doesn’t count against her for Fallout. In other words, if your friend is able to See with one die plus yours, that’s a Reversal; with two dice plus yours, that’s a Block or Dodge; with three dice plus yours, that’s Taking the Blow for three dice of Fallout.

TTFN,

Yoki