Ah, good. That’s what we thought and what I went with; but magic IS supposed to be dangerous, so wanted to make absolutely sure.
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Happy to help!
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Hey, got a question again: If a player fails a test, but then something happens in the same scene to where they feel they can try for the same result again, but with a different skill/stat, is that allowed? Or are retries barred for the remainder of the scene regardless?
I suspect I know the answer, but would like independent confirmation, just to be sure.
If all that has changed is that they want to try with a different skill/stat, then no.
In the Codex, Luke says that your result “stands for all similar obstacles in your path for the remainder of the session or until the in-game conditions significantly change.”
However, if things do significantly change, then you’re absolutely allowed to retest. Let’s you’re trying to move a boulder by rolling it aside and fail, suffering a Superficial Wound and being completely unable to get through by yourself; you wait for the backup that was on its way (that you wanted to keep ahead of) and together y’all erect a fancy lever system with 5 strong people getting everything moving: things have changed enough that you have a new opportunity to test.
Retesting is, and should be, rare. “Being wounded” (but not unconscious) isn’t enough of a change, even in a versus test where the wound might be enough to swing it. But discovering the shocking truth, gaining newfound powers (or losing them) and suddenly having an army on your side are all clearly significant changes.
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Their feelings are irrelevant; it’s your (the GM’s) feelings that matter here.
You gotta ask yourself if the situation really has meaningfully changed.
There’s nothing saying that that meaningful change can’t happen in the same scene. If you’re unsure, I would err on the side of the results riding.
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If I were being generous, I might allow another test straightaway if the second test transformed the scene on its own, f/ex:
If the players fail at persuading someone for information, I might allow them to Intimidate or Torture the information in the same scene.
However, I normally would try to forsee that potential consequence and either make it part of the failure, or foreclose it as part of the failure: if you fail to persuade the snitch to give you the plans for the castle, it means you’ll need to pay a whole lot of money for the information; if you fail to move the boulder (in my precious example) then when you injure yourself and have to wait, the group success is automatic because failure didn’t block entry, it removed your headstart.
If no-one can light a fire in this storm, the Sorcerer breaking their cover and forcing a flame alight in order to treat someone’s hypothermia is probably sufficiently transformative too.
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That makes sense, and is pretty much in line with what I thought.
Mine that came up was that someone in the group failed to Intimidate an NPC into silence, so I had the NPC Uno-reverse that into a blackmail attempt: “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t turn you in right now”. The player then came back with a truly epic Persuasion success (13 success vs Ob 10! Deed and Fate points well spent!) where they promised pretty much the NPC’s heart’s desire in exchange for both their silence and cooperation. And yes, that Ob was as high as it was partly because of the failed Intimidate check from before…
At the time, I allowed it as it was great fun and I take the stance of “if I don’t know and can’t find the rule in the book VERY quickly, go with what the table wants”. But I wanted to make sure that kind of thing was permitted for future situations. Thanks!
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That looks to me like a decent example of a different obstacle with a different failure consequence: your players weren’t testing to convince this person to keep quiet, they were testing to get the price right.
The original test result remains intact, but mollified somewhat. They didn’t get round the original test by trying again, the fiction and metafiction both show a failed attempt followed by a drastic reframing.
Great job, your instincts were spot-on. (Including doubling the Obstacle, in my opinion, I don’t tend to agree that people who just threatened me have my best interests at heart)
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That’s very near the “New Test” suggestion from the Codex. One issue I see is that there failure didn’t really complicate matters here. The player was in about the exact same position after the Intimidation test that they were in before.
So giving disadvantage on the new test and forcing them to take on an additional burden didn’t complicate matters enough for it to count?
Seems it was for a number of veteran GMs in this thread!
(lol) OK, just wanted to be sure. Thanks, everyone!
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Quick clarification: the disadvantage alone wouldn’t cut it, because that’s not an Interesting Consequence, and also because you shouldn’t post-hoc declare that a test works like a Linked Test.
But yeah, “being blackmailed” is, in my opinion, a vastly different situation than “convince someone Scot-free” (admittedly, in my games, ‘getting blackmailed’ might have been the direct failure consequence, skipping a test in between, but if you had a great failure consequence for the test then that’s awesome)
By the letter of the law and its intent, testing against the same obstacle—even modified—is not the correct use of this rule. The intent is not “you failed, now redouble your efforts.” The intent is, “you failed, move on and find another way.”
But shifting from Intimidate to Persuasion is a legitimate use of the system. Those are two separate intents with two separate tasks.
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