After some thought (and looking at other people's ideas) here's my idea to replace the halving mechanic. I freely give it up and assign all copyright and ownership of it to Mongoose. 8)
RULE: In any skill test (opposed or not, in combat or not) you have the option (if your skill is over 100) of subtracting 100 from your skill and giving yourself one extra free re-roll (of your own die roll). This ability is cumulative and can be applied multiple times if your skill is high enough that 100 can be subtracted from it multiple times. That is, if your skill is over 200 you have the option of either keeping the skill at 200 and rolling once, reducing it by 100 and getting one extra re-roll, or reducing it by 200 and getting 2 extra re-rolls.
CLARIFICATIONS: (1) If you have any re-rolls left and are making your roll, you can either keep your existing roll or decide to use up one of your re-rolls and replace your existing roll with that re-roll. In other words, you can't "go back" and take a previous roll. If you re-roll, you have to accept the results of the re-roll (unless you want to use up another re-roll, if you have one, to change them again.)
(2) In the case of an opposed skill roll, you always have the option (like in, say, poker) of saying "stand" to stand by your existing roll and not using any re-rolls. However, if your opponent rolls or re-rolls at any time after you say stand, you also then get the option of re-rolling. The person initiating the action (i.e., the attacker in a combat situation) is always the person who has to "bid first" and say "stand" first. In the event where neither initiated the action (say a contest where both are forced by some outside party to contest their singing skills) he person with the lower ORIGINAL (before we started subtracting 100's from the skill rolls) skill roll is the one at a disadvantage who has to roll first and say "stand" first. I will try to clarify this in the examples. But just think poker, where the aggressor/initiator or (in the event no one initiated it) the lower original score always has to bid first.
EXAMPLES:
Example 1: Crogthor wants to drive his chariot home in weather that is tricky enough that the GM decides he needs to roll against his driving skill of 146. He has the option of reducing his score by 100 to get a reroll, but decides not to. He rolls 85, a success, and drives his chariot.
Example 2: Kimberly wants to sing to impress her new employers. Her sing skill is 265. She could just not reduce her skill at all and leave things as is and have a 95% chance of success (anything less than or equal to 95 is not a failure.) However, she wants really to impress them and so wants a critical success. She knows that unless she gets a critical, they will soon be firing her and employing her rival Bimkerly. So she reduces her skill by 100 and gets 1 extra re-roll. So her new skill is 165 and she has one re-roll. Since her new skill is 165 and 10% of this is 16 (rounded down) she gets a critical if she rolls less than 16. Note that this does actually increase her chance of a critical from if she had left it at 265. This is because if her skill was 265 she would have a 26% chance of getting a critical but with one re-roll available her chance of a critical now is .16 + (.84)(.16) = .2944 or 29%.
Her first roll is a 46, a success but not a ciritical. She opts to use a re-roll.
Her second roll is 15, a critical success. Her emplyers are amazed.
Example 3: Bob needs to pilot his boat on a stormy sea. His boat skill is 270. The GM rules that the sea is particularly stormy and so he gets a 20% penalty, making his effective skill 250. He opts (perhaps unwisely, as he doesn't need a critical and probably should only have reduced his skill once) to reduce his skill by 200 to get 2 free re-rolls. So his skill is 50 and he gets 2 free re-rolls.
His first roll is 76, a failure. He opts to use a re-roll.
His second roll is 46, a success but not a ciritical. He didn't need a critical and so could stop here and successfully pilot the boat. He should stop here and not use any more re-rolls. He foolishly decides that he wants a critical success though and opts to use his last re-roll.
His third roll is 85, a failure. He fails at the task and his boat capsizes. Note that he can't "go back" to his previous successful roll.
Example 4: Jane has a skill of 20 in perception and Joe has a Stealth of 140. Joe wants to sneak by Jane. He opts not to use any re-rolls at all and not to reduce his skill.
Jane rolls a 25, a failure.
Joe rolls an 84, a success. Joe sneaks by Jane.
Example 5: Hydra has a 2H Axe skill of 380 and Morgrom has a Dodge of 450. They are attacking each other. Hydra opts to take 200 off his skill to make it 180 with 2 re-rolls. Morgrom takes 400 off his skill and makes it 50 with 4 re-rolls.
Hydra is the attacker so he has to say stand first.
At first, Hydra rolls a 78, a success, and says "stand". He could continue on and try for a critical but doesn't.
Morgrom rolls a 40, a success and says "stand".
Since Morgrom rolled after Hydra (the initiator rolled first) Hydra has the option of using one of his re-rolls and rolling again now. However, he is happy with the result (for some reason) and lets it go as is.
It proceeds to the effect of "attack succeeds but inflicts minimum damage; defender forced to give ground."
Example 6: Hydra attacks Morgrom again with the same setup as before.
Hydra rolls a 97, a failure. He opts to use one of his re-rolls and gets a 57, a success. He says "stand".
Morgrom rolls to dodge and gets a 60, a failure. He opts to re-roll and gets a 76, another failure. He opts to re-roll again and gets a 43, a success. He says "stand".
Since Morgrom was rolling all of this after Hydra, Hyrda has the option of re-rolling now and this time decides to. So hydra uses one of his re-rolls and gets a 34. This is the same setup as previously (both succeed) and Hydra wants to re-roll again. He rolls a 17, a critical success. He says "stand" He has used all of his re-rolls.
Morgrom says "eek, you got a critical!" He could stand as it but decides to re-roll to try get a (extremely unlikely, since his modified skill is 50 and so he only gets a critical success on 5 or less) critical. He rolls 34, a success. He opts to use his last re-roll and rolls again for a 65, a failure. He has no re-rolls left. He says "stand".
The final result was Hydra getting a critical and Morgrom failing.
DISCUSSION:
Why do I like this?
(1) It means someone with a skill over 100 always has the advantage over someone with a skill less than 100, as they can always choose not to reduced their skill at all and have no re-rolls.
(2) It means that people with epic level skills where both have skill over 300 can opt to reduce their skills to get re-rolls if they like.
(3) Arguably even halving is "difficult math" for some people (not me, I'm just saying this.) But anyone can subtract 100 and most people have played poker.
(4) I think the poker "stand" dynamic adds a little drama to higher level matches where both people have high skills. I mean 8) people do watch Texas Hold-Em on ESPN so it is at least sort of interesting to watch.
(5) It is a UNIFORM SYSTEM that applies to all types of skill rolls: opposed, in combat, out of combat, etc. I think this uniformity is nice. It makes it more aesthetically pleasing to me that everything is treated the same.
CONCLUDING NOTES:
This might be too much for them to put in patch notes. I at least encourage them to put it in their legendary book though. I think the current halving system it just too broken. I like this one for its uniformity and ease of use, as well as the drama it adds.
EDIT: If someone has already proposed this or this is the exact system of another game (I seem to recall people saying that another gae had rerolls as well) I apologize for the redundancy.
RULE: In any skill test (opposed or not, in combat or not) you have the option (if your skill is over 100) of subtracting 100 from your skill and giving yourself one extra free re-roll (of your own die roll). This ability is cumulative and can be applied multiple times if your skill is high enough that 100 can be subtracted from it multiple times. That is, if your skill is over 200 you have the option of either keeping the skill at 200 and rolling once, reducing it by 100 and getting one extra re-roll, or reducing it by 200 and getting 2 extra re-rolls.
CLARIFICATIONS: (1) If you have any re-rolls left and are making your roll, you can either keep your existing roll or decide to use up one of your re-rolls and replace your existing roll with that re-roll. In other words, you can't "go back" and take a previous roll. If you re-roll, you have to accept the results of the re-roll (unless you want to use up another re-roll, if you have one, to change them again.)
(2) In the case of an opposed skill roll, you always have the option (like in, say, poker) of saying "stand" to stand by your existing roll and not using any re-rolls. However, if your opponent rolls or re-rolls at any time after you say stand, you also then get the option of re-rolling. The person initiating the action (i.e., the attacker in a combat situation) is always the person who has to "bid first" and say "stand" first. In the event where neither initiated the action (say a contest where both are forced by some outside party to contest their singing skills) he person with the lower ORIGINAL (before we started subtracting 100's from the skill rolls) skill roll is the one at a disadvantage who has to roll first and say "stand" first. I will try to clarify this in the examples. But just think poker, where the aggressor/initiator or (in the event no one initiated it) the lower original score always has to bid first.
EXAMPLES:
Example 1: Crogthor wants to drive his chariot home in weather that is tricky enough that the GM decides he needs to roll against his driving skill of 146. He has the option of reducing his score by 100 to get a reroll, but decides not to. He rolls 85, a success, and drives his chariot.
Example 2: Kimberly wants to sing to impress her new employers. Her sing skill is 265. She could just not reduce her skill at all and leave things as is and have a 95% chance of success (anything less than or equal to 95 is not a failure.) However, she wants really to impress them and so wants a critical success. She knows that unless she gets a critical, they will soon be firing her and employing her rival Bimkerly. So she reduces her skill by 100 and gets 1 extra re-roll. So her new skill is 165 and she has one re-roll. Since her new skill is 165 and 10% of this is 16 (rounded down) she gets a critical if she rolls less than 16. Note that this does actually increase her chance of a critical from if she had left it at 265. This is because if her skill was 265 she would have a 26% chance of getting a critical but with one re-roll available her chance of a critical now is .16 + (.84)(.16) = .2944 or 29%.
Her first roll is a 46, a success but not a ciritical. She opts to use a re-roll.
Her second roll is 15, a critical success. Her emplyers are amazed.
Example 3: Bob needs to pilot his boat on a stormy sea. His boat skill is 270. The GM rules that the sea is particularly stormy and so he gets a 20% penalty, making his effective skill 250. He opts (perhaps unwisely, as he doesn't need a critical and probably should only have reduced his skill once) to reduce his skill by 200 to get 2 free re-rolls. So his skill is 50 and he gets 2 free re-rolls.
His first roll is 76, a failure. He opts to use a re-roll.
His second roll is 46, a success but not a ciritical. He didn't need a critical and so could stop here and successfully pilot the boat. He should stop here and not use any more re-rolls. He foolishly decides that he wants a critical success though and opts to use his last re-roll.
His third roll is 85, a failure. He fails at the task and his boat capsizes. Note that he can't "go back" to his previous successful roll.
Example 4: Jane has a skill of 20 in perception and Joe has a Stealth of 140. Joe wants to sneak by Jane. He opts not to use any re-rolls at all and not to reduce his skill.
Jane rolls a 25, a failure.
Joe rolls an 84, a success. Joe sneaks by Jane.
Example 5: Hydra has a 2H Axe skill of 380 and Morgrom has a Dodge of 450. They are attacking each other. Hydra opts to take 200 off his skill to make it 180 with 2 re-rolls. Morgrom takes 400 off his skill and makes it 50 with 4 re-rolls.
Hydra is the attacker so he has to say stand first.
At first, Hydra rolls a 78, a success, and says "stand". He could continue on and try for a critical but doesn't.
Morgrom rolls a 40, a success and says "stand".
Since Morgrom rolled after Hydra (the initiator rolled first) Hydra has the option of using one of his re-rolls and rolling again now. However, he is happy with the result (for some reason) and lets it go as is.
It proceeds to the effect of "attack succeeds but inflicts minimum damage; defender forced to give ground."
Example 6: Hydra attacks Morgrom again with the same setup as before.
Hydra rolls a 97, a failure. He opts to use one of his re-rolls and gets a 57, a success. He says "stand".
Morgrom rolls to dodge and gets a 60, a failure. He opts to re-roll and gets a 76, another failure. He opts to re-roll again and gets a 43, a success. He says "stand".
Since Morgrom was rolling all of this after Hydra, Hyrda has the option of re-rolling now and this time decides to. So hydra uses one of his re-rolls and gets a 34. This is the same setup as previously (both succeed) and Hydra wants to re-roll again. He rolls a 17, a critical success. He says "stand" He has used all of his re-rolls.
Morgrom says "eek, you got a critical!" He could stand as it but decides to re-roll to try get a (extremely unlikely, since his modified skill is 50 and so he only gets a critical success on 5 or less) critical. He rolls 34, a success. He opts to use his last re-roll and rolls again for a 65, a failure. He has no re-rolls left. He says "stand".
The final result was Hydra getting a critical and Morgrom failing.
DISCUSSION:
Why do I like this?
(1) It means someone with a skill over 100 always has the advantage over someone with a skill less than 100, as they can always choose not to reduced their skill at all and have no re-rolls.
(2) It means that people with epic level skills where both have skill over 300 can opt to reduce their skills to get re-rolls if they like.
(3) Arguably even halving is "difficult math" for some people (not me, I'm just saying this.) But anyone can subtract 100 and most people have played poker.
(4) I think the poker "stand" dynamic adds a little drama to higher level matches where both people have high skills. I mean 8) people do watch Texas Hold-Em on ESPN so it is at least sort of interesting to watch.
(5) It is a UNIFORM SYSTEM that applies to all types of skill rolls: opposed, in combat, out of combat, etc. I think this uniformity is nice. It makes it more aesthetically pleasing to me that everything is treated the same.
CONCLUDING NOTES:
This might be too much for them to put in patch notes. I at least encourage them to put it in their legendary book though. I think the current halving system it just too broken. I like this one for its uniformity and ease of use, as well as the drama it adds.
EDIT: If someone has already proposed this or this is the exact system of another game (I seem to recall people saying that another gae had rerolls as well) I apologize for the redundancy.
