TN 11 -- does it cause a problem?

[Durgil]

The difference between any two consequtive numbers between 1-10 is 10%, between 11-20 the difference is 1%, and between 21-30 there is only 0.1%.  The chance is reduced by a factor of 10 as you continue to go up.  The problem comes up between 10 and 11, 20 and 21, etc.  There is no difference in the odds for those TN's.

Let say you have a player who starts off with the default skill rating of 13 (beginner) in Streetwise.  He works on this skill and brings this rating down to 11.  At the end of another successful adventure, the Seneschal rules that rating goes down another point to 10.  Without any change in the Attributes used to determine the size of the dice pool used, the character receives no change in his overall chance to succeed at performing this skill.  Should the Seneschal rule that his new skill rating should drop to 9 or maybe it should have gone from 12 to 10, or he could rule that nothing changes.  I kind of like to see a regular progression, so I created the above tables for my own game just incase this situation occurs.

You also run into this sort of problem when a character's TN is altered do to their choice of actions such as an Evasive Attack.  In the end you do what feels right and fair to you I guess.

[Brian Leybourne]

Personally I find this whole conversation a bit silly, but whatever floats your boat I guess.

Anyway, all I was going to say is that there is a difference between skill levels of 10 and 11, because of bonuses and penalties. Yes, some just affect the die pool, but others affect the TN, making a 10 more desireable than an 11, so it's not a waste of experience (or whatever) to improve from a TN11 to TN10.

Just my 2c.

Brian.

[Henry Fitch]

Okay, I can see how it would be annoying when it made a character advancement or tactical decision worthless. Easy to workaround by just subtracting another point from the TN for free if the player complains, through. I definitely wouldn't advise giving up on the game for this reason; seems like swearing off a novelist because they end sentences with prepositions, or something.

[Bob Richter]

I went to bed thinking on this subject, prophet118.  Would it work to add a number equal to the tens number of the resulting TN?  example: you compute a TN of 13, add 1, it is now 14.  The only one it doesn't work for is 10; just leave 10 alone.  An 18 becomes 19, 19 becomes 20, and 20 becomes a 22.  Do you see what I'm talking about?

Actually, it works great for 10. The entire problem here is that a ten is always an eleven. :)

[Bob Richter]

Uh... guys? Is there any reason this TN10=TN11 thing would actually cause a problem in play? 'Cause I'm not seeing why this is a problem.

Well, for example, say I'm fighting a guy with a TN7 weapon and I raise his ATN by 4 with an evasive attack...oops.

That was stupid, since TN11 is precisely the same as TN10!

I should have used 3 dice...or 5. The fourth die is just wasted.

THAT is the problem, and any other similar situation.

[toli]

This whole discussion seems a bit silly at this point, to me.  Statistically when rolling dice vs a TV 10 and 11 are the same.  UNLESS one uses the previously suggested method of making the added die roll a 0 - 9 not 1 - 10 OR just skips TN 11 for either TN10 or TN12 (depending upon whether you are going up or down).  

How you chose to solve it depends a little bit on your view of the 10-11-12 break.  One might also consider this glitch as a realistic cost for going from 10 to 12 or 12 to 10.  That is, learing a bit of a skill from the default of 13 isn't too hard (13 to 12) but your chance of success per die is still below 10%.  Really getting it down to functioning levels ( >10% chance of success per die, 9 or below) is harder hence the additional cost of the "meaningless" 11TN.  A PC would simply have to go a bit longer at a 10% probability of success per die (TN 10 or 11) before learing enough to really improve.  Likewise when doing an evasive attack it might cost more to increase your opponents TN at this higher level indicating some added difficulty in making the increase.  Hence TN11 doesn't really get you any higher than TN10.

NT