Special Techniques and Stunts

[Prime_Evil]

I just had a wild idea and was wondering if it is worth developing further. Here's a quick outline:

Imagine that there was a system similar to Combat Manoeuvers for use with non-combat skills. Each skill offers access to a number of special techniques that allow characters to perform some kind of cool stunt. For example, the Perception skill might have a technique called Deduction allowing characters to interpret evidence like Sherlock Holmes. In effect, each technique allows the character to do some awesome cinematic exploit.

By default, characters do not know any of the special techniques attached to their skills - they must spend Improvement Rolls to acquire them. Each skill should have at least 4-6 techniques attached to them so that characters have a selection of potential stunts to choose from. It is assumed that these stunts will replace Heroic Abilities and the rules for them will be dropped from the game.

On a successful skill roll, characters may choose to use a special technique that they have learned at the cost of a single Hero Point. However, on a critical success, they may activate a technique at no cost whatsoever. Thus, techniques are performed in an opportunistic manner similar to Combat Manoevers. Indeed, when characters make an opposed roll against an NPC it is necessary to compare the success levels achieved by each party in exactly the same way that you do with Combat Manoeuvers to determine how many special techniques each party could potentially choose to activate.

The use of Hero Points to perform stunts is a deliberate design consideration - it allows the GM to decide how often special techniques can be performed by controlling the supply of Hero Points. In a highly cinematic game, awesome stunts might be commonplace, but in a grim and gritty setting they could be very rare.

What do people think so far? Is this a viable concept or is it a silly idea?

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

So something like Feats in D&D only tied to a Critical Success?

The idea is intriguing and could be adapted to your game pretty easily. It all depends on how gritty you want your setting to be.

If you want Xena or something like that, then adding these Stunts makes a lot of sense. I would not add it to a Sword and Sorcery game. I think it could have its place in the Optional Rules book!

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

If you allow Stunts for Critical Successes, then you will also need "Fumbles" for complete failures - tied to each skill of course.

Could be fun developing a list from TV, books and movies for each skill.

 

[soltakss]

That sounds like a good idea.

It could be used for opposed rolls, where two skills are competing, to add more granularity to the result.

It could also be used to create special effects on single rolls, to add flavour to the success or to allow extra things to happen.

Thinking up the special effects might be difficult, but is certainly doable.

It the results were made OGC then it would be even better.

 

[Prime_Evil]

So something like Feats in D&D only tied to a Critical Success?

Not exactly. You can perform a stunt on a normal success, but you need to spend a Hero Point to do so. But if you roll a Critical Success, you get to perform a stunt for free. You must succeed on an unopposed skill roll BEFORE you can perform a stunt, which means that difficulty modifiers can reduce the chance of activating your favourite stunt.

I've taken this approach for two reasons. Firstly, I wanted to adopt an approach similar to the one used by Combat Manoeuvers - but Combat Manoeuvers depend upon the fact that fights are essentially a series of opposed rolls while skill rolls are often unopposed. And there isn't an existing mechanic that lets you to perform a Combat Manoeuver on an unopposed roll with your weapon skill - such as when trying to chop through an inanimate object with a battleaxe.

Secondly, I wanted to explicitly tie the concept of stunts to the use of Hero Points - this allows the GM to control how wild things can get by increasing or restricting the supply of Hero Points. By default, new adventurers start the game with two hero Points and earn two additional Hero Points at the end of each story arc. I'm thinking about increasing the range of things that Hero Points can be used for, but also changing the way that they are awarded. For example, if you reduce the number of Hero Points awarded per story to one, you get a grim and gritty game where every Hero Point is precious and characters will hoard them to downgrade Major Wounds to Serious Injuries. On the other hand, if you increase the supply of Hero Points to three or four per story then characters will be able to spend them in dramatic situations while still keeping one or two spare for contingencies.

For a while, I was toying with the idea of having different stunts cost different number of Hero Points to activate - those that are quasi-realistic would cost only one hero Point, while those that are more cinematic might cost two or three. This would make really spectacular stunts rare. I'm not sure that the payoff from this approach is worth the extra complexity.

The idea is intriguing and could be adapted to your game pretty easily. It all depends on how gritty you want your setting to be.

If you want Xena or something like that, then adding these Stunts makes a lot of sense. I would not add it to a Sword and Sorcery game. I think it could have its place in the Optional Rules book!

The idea grew out of my dissatisfaction with the way that Heroic Abilities are implemented in MRQ II / Legend. These have always seemed like something tacked onto the system to compete with d20 feats. RQ6 went in one direction with mysticism to eliminate Heroic Abilities and I'm exploring another possibility....

 

[Prime_Evil]

It the results were made OGC then it would be even better.

I'm seriously thinking about it

 

[havercake lad]

I'm sure some of the Special Effect rules in the Chaosium monograph book Gods of Law could be adapted into your ideas .

 

[Prime_Evil]

I'm sure some of the Special Effect rules in the Chaosium monograph book Gods of Law could be adapted into your ideas .

I hadn't thought of this, but I think you're right.

I've also wondered whether some of the existing Heroic Abilities might be converted to stunts...