Some technical questions

[Tor Erickson]

Okay: if I roll a  8, 8, 9 and he rolls a 4, 5, 8, do I win with one victory (for the nine) or two (for the nine and the second 8?).  Or what if I rolled 8,8,8,8 and you rolled 8, would I win with one victory or three?

And, is the kicker meant to be played out during the game, or can it go either way?

-Tor

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Tor,

"Okay: if I roll a 8, 8, 9 and he rolls a 4, 5, 8, do I win with one victory (for the nine) or two (for the nine and the second 8?)."

You win with one victory for the 9. The number of victories is equal to the number of dice of GREATER value than his highest die.

"Or what if I rolled 8,8,8,8 and you rolled 8, would I win with one victory or three?"

That is counted as a single victory for you, ONLY because of the special rule for rolling a single die.

"And, is the kicker meant to be played out during the game, or can it go either way?"

I'm not sure what this question means. By definition, the character's first actions are going to be dealing with the Kicker. By "played out," do you mean resolved? And if the Kicker isn't resolved during play, what alternative is there? (That is, barring simply ignoring it for some reason, which is hard to imagine if the GM is doing his job.)

Best,
Ron

[Blake Hutchins]

Hi Ron,

I had planned to send this question to you via e-mail, but Tor's question appears here conveniently, so I'll post it here as a related get-into-the-guts-of-the-mechanics issue.

On p. 92, Sorcerer offers the example of Joanna's summoning roll, which she wins with one victory.  Her roll was 10, 10, 8, 7, 7, 5, and the demon's roll was 10, 5, 5, 5.  Checking for understanding here, is it one victory because the demon's 10 cancels one 10 of Joanna's, but her other 10 applies as a single victory against that same demon's 10?

Thanks for the assistance.  I feel I'm missing something here and am ready for enlightenment.

Best,

Blake

[Tor Erickson]

On 2001-11-04 00:14, Ron Edwards wrote:
Hi Tor,


"Or what if I rolled 8,8,8,8 and you rolled 8, would I win with one victory or three?"

That is counted as a single victory for you, ONLY because of the special rule for rolling a single die.

And if I rolled 8,8,8,8 and you rolled 8, 8?  Also one victory?

"And, is the kicker meant to be played out during the game, or can it go either way?"

I'm not sure what this question means. By definition, the character's first actions are going to be dealing with the Kicker. By "played out," do you mean resolved? And if the Kicker isn't resolved during play, what alternative is there? (That is, barring simply ignoring it for some reason, which is hard to imagine if the GM is doing his job.)

Best,
Ron

Hmm, that was a bit of an unclear question on my part.  What I meant to say was, is the actual kicker itself (finding the money in the suitcase, learning that my long-lost father is in town) meant to be role-played, or does it happen before actual play starts?
Thanks,
Tor

[Ron Edwards]

Blake,

It should be very easy.

"On p. 92, Sorcerer offers the example of Joanna's summoning roll, which she wins with one victory. Her roll was 10, 10, 8, 7, 7, 5, and the demon's roll was 10, 5, 5, 5. Checking for understanding here, is it one victory because the demon's 10 cancels one 10 of Joanna's, but her other 10 applies as a single victory against that same demon's 10?"

There are two issues at work here. The first is that the example is an error - see the Errata section at the website. The second is that the tying high 10's for each roll go away.

Therefore, it works like this. The two high 10's in each roll cancel. Poof. Gone. We are left with Joanna's remaining dice of 10, 8 7, 7, and 5; and the demon's dice of 5, 5, and 5. Therefore Joanna has four high dice over the demon's highest, winning with four victories.

Best,
Ron

[Ron Edwards]

Tor,

"And if I rolled 8,8,8,8 and you rolled 8, 8? Also one victory?"

Nope. That's two victories. The two high 8's on each side cancel and the remaining 8s are two victories. The one-victory-only rule only applies to keep a single-die character from being utterly hosed by a tie. But once you have more than one die on either side, just go by the regular rules.

Regarding Kickers, I either begin with the character essentially staring at the Kicker exactly at the microsecond after it occurs, or we might pick up with a description by the player of the next day or week of the character's life. It really depends on the physical immediacy of the Kicker and is highly customized.

One thing I do NOT do is begin a character well in advance of the character's Kicker. The best illustration for why not is provided by Don Lag in the Actual Play forum, regarding one of his playtests for his game Oscura.

Best,
Ron

[Blake Hutchins]

Hi Ron,

Ah, yes.  So clear now.  Excuse me while I smack myself on the head and go read the Errata section on the website.

Thanks,

Blake

[Ron Edwards]

Actually, Blake, I'm the one doing the self-head-smacking. It's my fault there even IS an Errata section, after all.

Some days, it almost seems worth it to pay an office lackey just to have someone around to blame stuff on.

Best,
Ron

[ This Message was edited by: Ron Edwards on 2001-11-04 22:56 ]

[random]

On 2001-11-04 19:25, Ron Edwards wrote:
"And if I rolled 8,8,8,8 and you rolled 8, 8? Also one victory?"

Nope. That's two victories. The two high 8's on each side cancel and the remaining 8s are two victories. The one-victory-only rule only applies to keep a single-die character from being utterly hosed by a tie. But once you have more than one die on either side, just go by the regular rules.

Ahh... In the rules, if I recall correctly:  if the two highest dice match, you discard them and compare the next highest pair.  If you run out of pairs, then it's a tie.

And, looking at the "Rules Question" section of the sorcerer-rpg site:

http://www.sorcerer-rpg.com/brochure.php/faq2.html

this is addressed explicitly.  (The roll there is 10,10,4,4,2 vs 10,10 -- same smell, different nostril, as it were.)

Cheers,

rnd

[Ron Edwards]

Random's right. Sorry about that.

Best,
Ron