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Best In Life - Imperial Knight Order Quest [Warhammer Fantasy]

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Swordomatic said:
The look that she then gives you nearly makes your blood freeze. Just for a moment you feel like you're back in the woods, surrounded by armies of beastmen, accompanied only by a dwindling party. "You shame Shallya with such statements, Lady Johanna. Kindly never do so again before me." Her mask cracks, and Sunnhilde looks at you with a demure grimace. "Please?"
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BEST

GIRL

[X] Mediocre or not, you still need an order. They shall stay, so you can beat some worth into them.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.

That was atrocious. Reminds me of the time I sent Karl's Reiksguard against Vlad's unit of half-dead Blood Knights who couldn't counter charge because they got hit by the Net of Amyntok. Half the Reiksguard died.

Granted, their target were Blood knights, but still, I kind of expected more from all the bonuses I put on them.
 
Even with exploding dice they really should not have had that kind of success at the start of the fight when they did not even know we were coming and were so out matched in stats.
[X] Mediocre or not, you still need an order. They shall stay, so you can beat some worth into them.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.
 
[X] Mediocre or not, you still need an order. They shall stay, so you can beat some worth into them.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.

Ouch, and we were told to not be too harsh on those knights. Such a shame that they are fell by melee instead of tricks and traps.
 
[X] Mediocre or not, you still need an order. They shall stay, so you can beat some worth into them.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.
 
Stewart9 said:
Even with exploding dice they really should not have had that kind of success at the start of the fight when they did not even know we were coming and were so out matched in stats.
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I disagree. Outside of it being kind of hard to hide a force of any knights traveling through anywhere, the first rolls were just for maneuvers. They outmaneuvered us. As someone expecting bad feels and half the order dead with those rolls, I was pleasantly surprised.

Though I am kind of worried that our entire force was nearly wiped out by bandits. It does not speak well of future dice variance. @Swordomatic How would the Johanna interrupt have gone if it wasn't a high roll? She was adding her rolls the whole time, if not actively murdering the enemy, so I'm wondering how her failing against bandits would have been portrayed.

Also, thank goodness no one saw this. No one involved would ever live down the shame.
 
Kairos123 said:
I disagree. Outside of it being kind of hard to hide a force of any knights traveling through anywhere, the first rolls were just for maneuvers. They outmaneuvered us. As someone expecting bad feels and half the order dead with those rolls, I was pleasantly surprised.

Though I am kind of worried that our entire force was nearly wiped out by bandits. It does not speak well of future dice variance. @Swordomatic How would the Johanna interrupt have gone if it wasn't a high roll? She was adding her rolls the whole time, if not actively murdering the enemy, so I'm wondering how her failing against bandits would have been portrayed.

Also, thank goodness no one saw this. No one involved would ever live down the shame.
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I can see his point. They didn't know we were coming, partially on account of the really good scouting rolls, so them still finding out about us, and setting up a killer ambush that would have crippled or even ended our Order before it even started seems quite a bit devil ex machina.
 
[X] Mediocre or not, you still need an order. They shall stay, so you can beat some worth into them.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.
 
[X] Mediocre or not, you still need an order. They shall stay, so you can beat some worth into them.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.
 
[X] Tell your Knights to wander the Empire, righting wrongs and accomplishing deeds. They are not to return until they have proven themselves or die trying.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.

Those knights are scrubs, we gave them the chance to become inner circle and they even rolled OK (above 50) and they still couldn't do it. Let's send them off to do something useful and focus on the initiates who have some potential.
 
Zedman7054 said:
I can see his point. They didn't know we were coming, partially on account of the really good scouting rolls, so them still finding out about us, and setting up a killer ambush that would have crippled or even ended our Order before it even started seems quite a bit devil ex machina.
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As they say, that's Warhammer!

No but seriously it was winnable until that atrocious Engagement roll.

If Johanna flubbed she would have failed to make an impact and then everyone would have run away with slightly more casualties and a lot more failure.
 
WorldSlayer said:
Those knights are scrubs, we gave them the chance to become inner circle and they even rolled OK (above 50) and they still couldn't do it. Let's send them off to do something useful and focus on the initiates who have some potential.
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I'd rather train both groups into the Mud. That shite performance may have been acceptable in the Reiksgaurd, where you have a 1000 other assholes to cover for your bitchness, but we're CK2 Protags! We need to be strong enough to gangbang GRAIL KNIGHTS!
 
Zedman7054 said:
I can see his point. They didn't know we were coming, partially on account of the really good scouting rolls, so them still finding out about us, and setting up a killer ambush that would have crippled or even ended our Order before it even started seems quite a bit devil ex machina.
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On the other hand, they are (well, were) outlaws, meaning that being on the lookout for what passes for law enforcement in the region was a given. They may not have expected knights per see, but they wouldn't have survived this long - to the point where the Emperor himself felt they became a nuisance - without some level of paranoia.
 
Swordomatic said:
The Bandits had exploding dice. If you manage to roll 100 including modifiers, you get an extra dice. If with that you manage to roll 200, you get another. And so on and so forth. Might change it to nat 100s in the future but this is actually part of the exercise so.

Johanna benefits from this too, since her only actual bonus during her interrupt is her (very monstrous) Martial, but I didn't label the bonuses because it's very unwieldy to read.
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...Yeah, I would change that to "you need to roll a natural 95 or better, modifiers don't count", so a 1-in-20 chance of exploding. Factoring in stat bonuses is just going to result in consistently ridiculous results if you have a large enough modifier.
 
Arcus said:
...Yeah, I would change that to "you need to roll a natural 95 or better, modifiers don't count", so a 1-in-20 chance of exploding. Factoring in stat bonuses is just going to result in consistently ridiculous results if you have a large enough modifier.
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Yeah, especially considering that Johanna has an effective +46 to Maneuver in forests due to her monstrous Martial and her Fae Paths trait. It's insane that it didn't trigger at all here.
 
Swordomatic said:
Yeah, especially considering that Johanna has an effective +46 to Maneuver in forests due to her monstrous Martial and her Fae Paths trait. It's insane that it didn't trigger at all here.
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Nah, just bad luck. It was basically a coin flip.

The problem with allowing the dice to explode on 100 after modifiers is that you're get exploding dice every other roll if you have enough applicable bonuses, so a lot of your results are going to look like extreme outliers while not actually being extreme outliers.

Sheer dumb luck should be something that only happens occasionally and can turn things around when it does, so yeah, I'd make it "natural X only" to avoid screwiness from large modifiers.

torroar said:
Bipolar rolls seem to be a constant for quests on SV.

I say this from confusing experience.
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Honestly I think it might be a perception issue/the probability curves of the system in use being wonky. Getting a 10 on a d10 doesn't get the same instinctive reaction than rolling 91 or better on a d100 does, even though both results have the same chances of occurring.
 
[X] Mediocre or not, you still need an order. They shall stay, so you can beat some worth into them.
[X] Your initiates proved themselves, and so you won't be disappointed in them. But they can be more. Teach them how.
 
MS-21H 'Hawke' said:
I'd rather train both groups into the Mud. That shite performance may have been acceptable in the Reiksgaurd, where you have a 1000 other assholes to cover for your bitchness, but we're CK2 Protags! We need to be strong enough to gangbang GRAIL KNIGHTS!
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That's the scrub mode way to fight grail knights. The real test is if you can take one on solo and make them bite the pillow. :ogles:
 
Other people have said it better, but here's my thoughts on it. I agree with Arcus.

1d100 vs 1d100 is already going to give you a lot of variance. Adding explosive dice just means explosively increasing that variance. Which is all fine and dandy until peasants start killing dragons, Grail Knights trip over their own lances into skeleton spears, Abhorash goes out like a chump, and Skulltaker murders the entirety of the Empire's military. Of course, these are all hilarious exaggerations... that nonetheless become possible - if deeply unlikely - with exploding dice. You might be thinking of possible third order criticals, think fifth or ninth order. The sheer insanity of something like that regardless of skill or ability. That's what you open yourself up to when allowing explosive crits with massive modifiers.

My main concern is simply that characters and armies performances aren't representative of their skill. Up to a point that's expected: bad days, changing circumstances, shitty matchups, just messing up, all that doesn't stretch SOD and makes sense. But only up to a point. Not much of a problem here, where even though there is a ten point difference in martial (and Johanna was leading them), it's not unreasonable. In a lot of conditions, it's going to be similarly fine, but there will be other times when it isn't. For example, seeing someone defined as one of the best fighters in the Empire, nearing the limits of a mortal frame, with a name like 'Skullcracker' fail to make a difference against bandits raises a lot of pointed questions.

By all means, experiment with it some more if you want, but past experience tells me that allowing explosive crits like that, doesn't just invite more, it assures that you will reach that ridiculous point where they lose nearly all value by becoming expected, simply appealing to the part of the brain that likes seeing big numbers.

The 95+ rule is an excellent compromise, but even then you are probably going to see it much more than you think. It sounds interesting though, with a roll like that swinging battles.
MS-21H 'Hawke' said:
I'd rather train both groups into the Mud. That shite performance may have been acceptable in the Reiksgaurd, where you have a 1000 other assholes to cover for your bitchness, but we're CK2 Protags! We need to be strong enough to gangbang GRAIL KNIGHTS!
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You get an internet cookie, this made me giggle.
 
Personally, I would prefer crits on only rolls of 1 or 100, but I despise crit fails in general. The other thing is that I feel that noticing our approach, gathering up his (disorganized) bandits, and setting a good ambush should be separate rolls.

Also, 10 is average, right? It feels odd to me that a crappy bandit who has a notably poor martial score is getting a bonus on his roll, rather than a penalty.
 
Kairos123 said:
My main concern is simply that characters and armies performances aren't representative of their skill. Up to a point that's expected: bad days, changing circumstances, shitty matchups, just messing up, all that doesn't stretch SOD and makes sense. But only up to a point. Not much of a problem here, where even though there is a ten point difference in martial (and Johanna was leading them), it's not unreasonable. In a lot of conditions, it's going to be similarly fine, but there will be other times when it isn't. For example, seeing someone defined as one of the best fighters in the Empire, nearing the limits of a mortal frame, with a name like 'Skullcracker' fail to make a difference against bandits raises a lot of pointed questions.
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Well, I suppose it can depend on how you do it too. To take that last example, I can imagine that should bad luck strike and Johanna had messed up her rolls, instead of flat failure, most of the bandits could still end up dead, but with some injuries for Johanna and more losses from the Order. The dice don't need to be strictly binary (failure/success), and when there's an obvious mismatch, the underdog rolling exceedingly well might still end up with as good a result as realistically plausible (for instance, peasants vs dragon could end up with the dragon suffering a small injury, being annoyed by the peasantry's resistance and just deciding he has more important things to do today, instead of flat out turning in "and then, the peasants stoned the dragon to death")
 
I try to temper my dice rolls as much as possible. As Johanna said, your knights did well enough under the circumstances. If it were state troops in that position there would be a lot more than three dead and three maimed.

Johanna rolling a Nat 1 would have meant taking damage, but she's still a terminator and she would have still chased the banditry away. They would have just, y'know, gotten away.

A peasant who manages to roll 600 on exploding dice against a chaos lord winds up ramming a sword through a gap in their blessed plate and buying a few more seconds before they are immolated by flaming laser eyes. That's all.
 
Kairos123 said:
Other people have said it better, but here's my thoughts on it. I agree with Arcus.

1d100 vs 1d100 is already going to give you a lot of variance. Adding explosive dice just means explosively increasing that variance. Which is all fine and dandy until peasants start killing dragons, Grail Knights trip over their own lances into skeleton spears, Abhorash goes out like a chump, and Skulltaker murders the entirety of the Empire's military. Of course, these are all hilarious exaggerations... that nonetheless become possible - if deeply unlikely - with exploding dice. You might be thinking of possible third order criticals, think fifth or ninth order. The sheer insanity of something like that regardless of skill or ability. That's what you open yourself up to when allowing explosive crits with massive modifiers.

My main concern is simply that characters and armies performances aren't representative of their skill. Up to a point that's expected: bad days, changing circumstances, shitty matchups, just messing up, all that doesn't stretch SOD and makes sense. But only up to a point. Not much of a problem here, where even though there is a ten point difference in martial (and Johanna was leading them), it's not unreasonable. In a lot of conditions, it's going to be similarly fine, but there will be other times when it isn't. For example, seeing someone defined as one of the best fighters in the Empire, nearing the limits of a mortal frame, with a name like 'Skullcracker' fail to make a difference against bandits raises a lot of pointed questions.

By all means, experiment with it some more if you want, but past experience tells me that allowing explosive crits like that, doesn't just invite more, it assures that you will reach that ridiculous point where they lose nearly all value by becoming expected, simply appealing to the part of the brain that likes seeing big numbers.

The 95+ rule is an excellent compromise, but even then you are probably going to see it much more than you think. It sounds interesting though, with a roll like that swinging battles.

You get an internet cookie, this made me giggle.
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I suggested 95 because it allows for crits to happen every now and then without happening every other roll.

I personally feel you don't want to make crits too rare (if you have them at all), because you still have to write up the results for the roll. When you get an utterly ridiculous outlier result, you need to come up with something suitably epic to match. That said this is very much up to the GM to decide if they want those kinds of moments in their story, and dependent on the tone of the story they want to write.
 
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