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How Do Skills Work? (Patreon)

Published:
2024-03-29 18:28:55
Imported:
2026-06
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Ever since we revealed the power roll, A LOT of you have been asking, “How does this affect tests and skills?” I’ve hinted at the answer to this question before over on Twitch and in the MCDM Discord, but I want to reveal the mechanics in full detail for you right now by showing you what I sent to our playtesters. It’s attached to this post!

Please keep in mind that while I have gone over this document a few times, it’s still playtesting and hasn’t been edited yet. This thing will be a lot more polished once it gets into the book!

So that’s what you’re looking at! It’s a short Patreon post, but an attachment over 5,000 words, so enjoy! As a reminder, we’re not looking for design suggestions. We want to share our process with you.

Thanks so much!

—James

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Comments

GodlyPie

These Tests rules are pretty good! I can see the potential and I would like to test them as soon as possible!

Schoopdoop McGoop

I love that the list of skills is so long and broken up into categories that aren't based on Characteristics. That's so good!

Hive_Indicator

"A test is a power roll that has failure as an option." This is a great definition!

Trychydts

How much of a problem is the continuous onslaught of design suggestions? The reminders you don't need any sure feels a little tiring after the 1000th time.

ThePattycakes

Have you considered leaving off a skill like Timescape which seems more specific to one setting than other?

Kelby

Nice doc. Clearly articulated. I like the simplicity of the tests, and the consistent examples really help with understanding the intent. I like how opposed rolls are optional, but unnecessary, reducing the Director/Player multi-rolls to determine outcomes, speeding up that RNG generator. Looks great!

Patreon Yeeter

Doom and vanquish (or fortune?) tokens 😳 I look forward to hearing more about those!

mcdm

How'd those get in there? -James

Dhavaram

I feel like there should be a 3rd, easier difficulty than "challenging" which is basically impossible to fail for a hero that has trained in a relavant skill and has a good stat related to the task, but that a hero that isnt skilled in that task and/or doesn't have a great stat would probably succeed at but COULD fail. Like a mage who has low might trying to climb a wall or a Fury with a low reason score trying to figure out a puzzle.

David L

I mean I think for the "challenging" difficulty the math still pretty much works out like that. Having a +4 to the power roll (assuming +3 from the characteristic and +1 from the skill prof.) means you're only failing on a roll of 1-1 or 1-2. If at higher levels you can get up to +4 for a characteristic it would bring that down to only failing on a 1-1 roll. Anything easier there'd be no really point in make the test in the first place

Ormus Erebus

The game is pretty steeped in their lore, just as other non-generic games are. It's easy enough to just replace "Timescape" with whatever the Director calls their multiverse

AndruC

In their discord, this would fall under the "no suggestions", something that was pointed out in this very post.

Dhavaram

But if you only have a +1 from your characteristic and +0 because you don't have the relevant skill, you will get a 7 or below (fail) in 15 out of 36 possibilities which is 41 and 2/3rds % of the time. I just feel like there should be a difficulty in which a less skilled person has a better chance of succeeding. These are supposed to be heroes, so even if you're not "good" at something, you are probably as good as the average townsperson at it, and failing over 40% of the time at the LEAST hard thing you have to actually roll for is pretty harsh.

Dhavaram

Im not giving suggestions, Im just pointing out that it seems harsh. At my table, I would definitely make a "normal" difficulty that maybe you only fail on a 5 or down, which with only a +1 from your weakest characteristic, is still failing 6 out of 36, or 1/6th of the time. I'm not suggesting they change what they are designing, I'm just making an observation.

Sergei Lakissov

As far as I understand, they just make it an automatic success. A test is called only when it serves some gameplay purpose, and with "easy" tests maybe there isn't much of a gameplay benefit of making them, which is why MCDM decided simply to get rid of them, at least in this iteration of the rules.

Aidan Boyle

I'm having trouble imagining what failure without consequence on a test in opposition looks like. If a player is in a tug-of-war match with an NPC, and fails, there's automatically a consequence of "the NPC wins", so is it just that I have to be able to imagine a hypothetical *worse* outcome for a Failure With Consequence?

Kyman201

I think more games need to start asking if you really need checks for everything. A lot of games are starting to embrace that like, only make skill checks if odds of success are in doubt and if failure is narratively interesting. Like your suggestions are examples of why this lower difficulty really ISN'T needed.

Kyman201

"You lose so badly that you fall on your face and look really silly. If you attempt to Negotiate later in this scene, you'll take a penalty on the check because you embarrassed yourself" Or something like that. I imagine in the full rules there could be a list of example "possible additional consequences"

NAC

Dhavaram

Here's an example drawn from my previous post of something I think is narratively interesting: Say the party is being chased by a horde of undead and they are trying to get up a 20 foot high ledge in the cave they are in to get away from them. Everyone but the mage has gotten to the top, but the mage fails on their roll, because they don't have climbing skill and their might characteristic is 1. If the mage doesn't have an ability to magic their way up there or maybe doesn't have enough class resource available, now the party has to figure out how to help. Do they go back down and fight the undead, throw him a rope and pull him up, watch him get torn to pieces in horror? If the mage doesnt have to roll, doesnt the shadow that took the climbing skill feel like that was a wasted skill pick for his character? Doesn't the fury with a 3 might feel like her physical prowess didnt make a difference in this situation, because the mage miracled his ass up the wall with his non-roll? I'm just asking what feels fun and right. If everyone just does everything that isn't too challenging (but in real life would have a chance of failure) without a roll, even in a pressure situation, doesn't that take away some of the funnest moments in RPGs? Failure, especially unexpected failure, often leads to some of the most memorable RPG moments.

Dhavaram

I agree with doing away with certain rolls, like when someone says "I search the desk" and the GM has them roll to see if they find anything. Unless there's a secret drawer or compartment, why are they rolling? They specifically said they were checking the desk, so if something is in the desk, just give it to them. Or the situation where the characters have spotted monsters/NPCs and the PCs ask what they look like or what armor they are wearing/what weapons they are wielding. Some GMs would have the players roll to see what they notice. Don't do that. Just describe the monsters.

Kyman201

In your "Climb this wall to evade the monsters" example, that's what the rules sample would call a Challenging Test, because there's a small chance of failure. If you need the players to get up the wall, don't make it a test. If you want to make it a test that can be failed, make it a test that can be failed. There's no need for an easier challenge type like you've been asking for.

PinkRose

If I read it correctly, it's not ranks, it's rank. Just one +1.

Dhavaram

If the mage has a 1 might and doesn't have climb skill, he fails to get up the wall 41.66% of the time. That's not a small chance of failure.

Kyman201

Okay, look. What does an easier level of challenge add beyond "Forcing the players to roll a test for something that's not really a challenge"? If you want the players to make it up the wall, have them make the climb. There's no need for an equivalent of D&D's DC 5 challenges. That's really not interesting or exciting or fun, it's just introducing the odds of failure that you didn't actually want them to fail. Like, challenges should be interesting, pass or fail. In my experience, your comment of "Doesn't [taking away low-DC skill checks] take away the funniest moments in RPGs?" - Maybe one or two. But in my experience, it's MORE often that it's just frustrating experiences for these nominal badass characters suddenly changing games to QWOP and faceplanting while walking down an empty hall. (If it's not obvious, I'm not a huge fan of calling for Skill Checks "Just Because". I in fact think those are bad design and only stick around because of legacy design)

Kyman201

However, in the interest of being more productive, if you WANT the illusion of risk but no actual FAILURE, maybe consider replacing the 2-7 result tier with "Success but with a minor twist" which can be something like "You get up the wall, BUT you get attacked by the monsters at your heel, lose X health" or "You get up the wall but some of your clothing gets left behind in the scramble, so the monsters will be able to track you down at a later scene"

Daniel

As a lover of Fitd and PbtA games. I'm curious if consequences and rewards make sense in a tactical game. In modern games, consequences and rewards are fairly arbitrary with guidelines. Added by the GM for the sake of narrative. However, I would suggest that consequences and rewards are not "Tactical". They are uncalculatable. Consequences that players cannot determine and GMs must create. Additionally, they add to the GM workload. In a tactical game, the players won't want new unexpected consequences that they didn't calculate, they aren't fun like FitD. So without rules to guide you, you must imagine and come up with something to harm your players. On the flip side, bonus rewards are extremely helpful for the players. The players may hound for additional bonuses, but the GM has to try and keep the fight balanced. The joy of tactical games is that the GM has an "excuse" to be mean. "I'm not harming you, this dragon is harming you. I have the stat block right here." Adding consequences and rewards strips away that veil from the GM, forcing them to add unnecessary arbitration. Furthermore, if you take away consequences and rewards, what do you have? The system is very similar to the old, but limits the success/failure TN to 8 or 11. That isn't terrible, as the players have a very recognizable target, but at the same token, a ton of power has been taken out of the GMs hands.

Arash - Game Narrative 101

Decoupling skills from attributes is so elegant and freeing! Very interested to see how this is gonna play 5 or so sessions into a campaign. Only thing I can't wrap my head around so far is assisting a test literally replacing numbers, but we'll see where things land :)

Arash - Game Narrative 101

Yeah just think about all the times a wizard or warlock or whatever wants to know if they read anything about the hells or the abyss because a necromancer's notes said something about demons

Arash - Game Narrative 101

Seems to me like it would be fine in play. For one, your Lead skill can be applied to any skill made with any attribute, so you will be doing different things (speech before battle, breaking the warlord's shield in negotiation, etc.) and you'd be gearing it towards Lead. This to me makes sense because that character DOES care a lot about leading and IS very good at it, so of course they'd be doing that a lot. Even then, though, Lead just gives a +1, so if your character would WANT to flirt instead of lead, they'd just be losing a +1. Doesn't seem like a big enough penalty to scare players away; but I'll have to wait to see my table play it to say that for sure.

AndruC

There are suggestions in these comments. How tiring do you think it is to continue getting them after 1000 reminders?

AndruC

"There should be a..." is a suggestion, whether you put "I feel" in front of it or not. Regardless, I'm not here to have a debate with you. Just letting you know this is exactly the kind of comment that is treated like a suggestion with respect to their moderation, whatever your intent was.

Dhavaram

Ok. So I should have worded it differently. Just 2 difficulty levels seems pretty restrictive. Now Im not making a suggestion.

Trychydts

First of all, Patreon is a community for the patrons, so any kind of discussion (ic not rude etc.) here should be allowed, or they should switch off the comment section. I, for one are interested in what others think of the game. In one of the livestreams it was stated that Patreon is enough to pay for Matt and James. I think that amount of support coul make up for quite some anxiety and stress caused by unsolicited opinions.

Steven V. Neiman

The results of using skills in combat are more formally prescribed, and out of combat D&D has always been like a clunkier version of a PBTA system with the GM inventing results on the fly. Success with a bonus and failure with a consequence might mean more outcomes than D&D generally has, but the results will still be fundamentally similar, with the GM deciding what kind of opportunity cost a failure has. Compared to that, this system is a little cleaner, though I will admit that I'm concerned that the two difficulties will be a bit limiting and the low bonus from skills will feel unimportant. Remember though, this kind of stuff will often feel different in play than you or I imagine from reading the rules. If you're a designer forethought can save you revisions or problems, but as a player it can often lead you to borrow trouble and to break perfectly good design because you wanted to fix a problem that only existed in your imagination. Trust me, I've done it plenty of times and it almost invariably made my life harder for no actual gain.

Tab

Correct, it's just the +1. You *have* the skill or you don't, it's nice and binary. (Same as in 5e, it just has a benefit that scales with level.) So you do slightly better at checks, and can "help" someone without the skill. So yes, you'll be better at Lead during social situations if that's the only interpersonal skill you have (assuming you always use the same attribute). But you won't be *hugely* better, just a bit, so while you'll *try* to Lead when you can, there's not a huge reason to twist *everything* into a Lead.

AndruC

Wow.

BasCB

Hm, but can't the other characters just throw that mage a rope, help them by standing on top of each other and letting them climb up, hold down a spear to grab onto etc? All of those might make the task (getting up the ledge) interesting and fun and probably don't require the mage to roll for climbing but do mean the players working together to solve it.

Dhavaram

I don't want the "illusion of risk". Most characters are really good at some things and really bad at others. So some tasks may be trivial for them (which shouldnt require a roll) while others are difficult, or at least NOT trivial. Meanwhile, someone else in the party might be challenged by the task that the previous character found trivial. So if you don't require a roll for everyone because one character finds the task trivial, that sucks for the player who chose to take the approprite skill. If you do require a roll, and you use the "easier" of the difficulties presented, then the unskilled character with a 1 in the associated characteristic fails 41.667%. There might be something that you think should be a challenge, but not that challenging. A 25% fail rate would be considered challenging in the real world, but there isnt any option for that. I guess you could just give them a couple of boosts because you, as the Director, deem the task to be easier than the lowest difficulty.

Zachary James Forsythe

I feel like, with the focus of skills being more niche and character driven, and also less broad and encompassing, you might want to use a different word than "skills". Saying I have these skills here implies that the ones I didn't pick are things for which I am unskilled. I could be wrong, but I don't think that is the intended vibe. Maybe borrowing a word like expertise would be better. I have a good enough roll for jumping and swimming and lifting because I have a good enough Might characteristic, but I have expertise in climbing.

Tableplaying Roletop

Very late to the party, but man that skill list has me so hyped! I absolutely love the test mechanics, it’s pretty much every MC YouTube video suggestion wrapped into a ruleset. *chef’s kiss*