[svn] r2079@freebird: fabien | 2006-01-05 17:44:21 -0500
Petite correction au texte.
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<chapter id="sactions" revision="$Revision: 1841 $ $Name$"
vendor="1.39" xmlns:xi="http://www.w3.org/2003/XInclude">
<title id="stactions">Action Resolution</title>
<para>For resolving an action in Harmonies, three aspects must be
determined. The first one is the type of action, the second its
difficulty, and the last is the <link
linkend="scompniveau">Competency Level</link>. Those details must
be determined by the Game Master and, again, the rules are simply
there to help her or to suggest some solutions. She can do
everything she want with.</para>
<section id="sdifficulte">
<title id="stdifficulte">Action Difficulty</title>
<para>The action difficulty give the chance of success of an
action for a typical character (one with zero in all her
attributes and competencies). A typical character will have 50%
to succeed an action of difficulty zero. An action with a
positive difficulty (low) will be easier to succeed than an
action with a negative difficulty (high).</para>
<para>The principle is simple. Choose first the Competency and
Attributes that will be used. The Game Master then choose the
difficulty for this particular action. This difficulty is the
same for everyone, whatever their level. It's the action
difficulty. Then, the Game Master can add or remove to the
difficulty depending on particular situations, like the ground
or the current visibility. For example, it's far more easy to
do an acrobatic jump on a flat and dry ground than on a wet
floor.</para>
<para>This is very similar to what we used for Attributes. When
an action is twice as difficult <emphasis>to succeed</emphasis>,
the difficulty is higher of 3 points (in Value, this mean that
we subtract 3 points to the difficulty of the action). If the
action is three time more difficult <emphasis>to
fail</emphasis>, it's mean that we <emphasis>add</emphasis> 5
points to the difficulty. The final difficulty is calculated by
adding the action difficulty, adjusted with the current
situation, to the <link linkend="scompniveau">Level of
Competency</link> of the character.</para>
<example id="xdifficulty">
<title id="xtdifficulty">Action Difficulty</title>
<para>A character with a Competency of +2 in Acrobatic try to do
a simple flip. The Game Master decide that this jump is a +3
difficulty (remember, the difficulty is for a caracter with 0
in Acrobatic, and a simple flip must be
<emphasis>easy</emphasis> for an acrobat). However, since it
rained all the afternoon, the Game Master add a adjustment of
-5 to the difficulty for a total of -2. Hopefully, the
character has +2 in Agility and +1 in Maneuver, this give him
a Level in Acrobatic of +5. The final difficulty will then be
( +5 + -2 = ) +3.</para>
</example>
<para><xref linkend="treussites"/> resumed the
<emphasis>approximated</emphasis> probabilities of success in
percentile for the final difficulty. They are, however, not
exact and should only be used to give an idea on the odds for a
given action.</para>
<table frame="all" id="treussites">
<title id="ttreussites">Probabilities of success of an
action</title>
<tgroup cols="11" align="center">
<colspec colnum="1" colwidth="1in" align="left"/>
<colspec colnum="2" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="3" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="4" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="5" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="6" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="7" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="8" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="9" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="10" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<colspec colnum="11" colwidth="0.55in"/>
<tbody>
<row rowsep="0">
<entry>Difficulty</entry>
<entry>-20</entry>
<entry>-19</entry>
<entry>-18</entry>
<entry>-17</entry>
<entry>-16</entry>
<entry>-15</entry>
<entry>-14</entry>
<entry>-13</entry>
<entry>-12</entry>
<entry>-11</entry>
</row>
<row>
<entry>Odds</entry>
<entry>0.5%</entry>
<entry>0.6%</entry>
<entry>0.7%</entry>
<entry>1.0%</entry>
<entry>1.2%</entry>
<entry>1.5%</entry>
<entry>2.0%</entry>
<entry>2.5%</entry>
<entry>3.0%</entry>
<entry>4.0%</entry>
</row>
<row rowsep="0">
<entry>Difficulty</entry>
<entry>-10</entry>
<entry>-9</entry>
<entry>-8</entry>
<entry>-7</entry>
<entry>-6</entry>
<entry>-5</entry>
<entry>-4</entry>
<entry>-3</entry>
<entry>-2</entry>
<entry>-1</entry>
</row>
<row>
<entry>Odds</entry>
<entry>5.0%</entry>
<entry>6.0%</entry>
<entry>8.0%</entry>
<entry>10%</entry>
<entry>12%</entry>
<entry>15%</entry>
<entry>20%</entry>
<entry>25%</entry>
<entry>30%</entry>
<entry>40%</entry>
</row>
<row rowsep="0">
<entry>Difficulty</entry>
<entry>+0</entry>
<entry>+1</entry>
<entry>+2</entry>
<entry>+3</entry>
<entry>+4</entry>
<entry>+5</entry>
<entry>+6</entry>
<entry>+7</entry>
<entry>+8</entry>
<entry>+9</entry>
</row>
<row>
<entry>Odds</entry>
<entry>50%</entry>
<entry>60%</entry>
<entry>70%</entry>
<entry>75%</entry>
<entry>80%</entry>
<entry>85%</entry>
<entry>88%</entry>
<entry>90%</entry>
<entry>92%</entry>
<entry>94%</entry>
</row>
<row rowsep="0">
<entry>Difficulty</entry>
<entry>+10</entry>
<entry>+11</entry>
<entry>+12</entry>
<entry>+13</entry>
<entry>+14</entry>
<entry>+15</entry>
<entry>+16</entry>
<entry>+17</entry>
<entry>+18</entry>
<entry>+19</entry>
</row>
<row>
<entry>Odds</entry>
<entry>95.0%</entry>
<entry>96.0%</entry>
<entry>97.0%</entry>
<entry>97.5%</entry>
<entry>98.0%</entry>
<entry>98.5%</entry>
<entry>98.8%</entry>
<entry>99.0%</entry>
<entry>99.2%</entry>
<entry>99.4%</entry>
</row>
</tbody>
</tgroup>
</table>
<para>In our preceding example, the +3 difficulty give a 75%
chance of success to our character.</para>
<note userlevel="adv">
<para>Someone said to me that the right probabilities to compare
two values is equal to the Measure of the Attacker divided by
the sum of both Measures. In our system, this give us that
for A <= B, if A = B, the difficulty is 0, if 0 < B-A
<= 3, the difficulty is -B-1, if 3 < B-A <= 6, the
difficulty is -B-2, and if B-A > 6, the difficulty is -B-3.
In the case that B is lesser then A, invert A and B. This
method is complicate and I don't find that it add something
needed. The remark is however right and that's why I put it
here.</para>
</note>
</section>
<section id="smarge">
<title id="stmarge">Margin of Success</title>
<para>The margin of success determine at which degree a character
have succeed or failed. This margin can influence the results
for the will of the Game Master, and this can go from the
apparent ease in the accomplishment, to the quality of the final
result. However, the margin of success shouldn't be used to
modify the action that the character try to accomplish. For
example, a character who try to do a simple flip will not do a
double flip if she got +3 degrees of success. Instead, her jump
will be simply more <emphasis>elegant</emphasis>.</para>
<para>The success margin is easy to find. When the final
difficulty is found, the player rolls the dice and add the
result to it. The total is the margin of success. If the
margin of success is equal or greater than zero, the action is
successful. If it's less than zero, the action has failed. We
can then also talk about a failure margin. For example, a
success margin of -3 is equivalent of a failure margin of
+3.</para>
</section>
<section id="sacttypes">
<title id="stacttypes">Action Types</title>
<para>The type of action help you to find how an action will be
resolved. They are mostly suggestions that make the game more
interesting and offer a kind of challenge to the players. There
are many types of actions presented here:</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>The <link linkend="sactsimple">simple actions</link> are
those that we can only success or fail and that only depends
on the ability of the character.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>The <link linkend="sopposition">actions in
opposition</link> are those that encounter a resistance from
one or many opponents.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>The <link linkend="sconfrontation">actions in
confrontation</link> permit a parry from the
adversary.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para><link linkend="sactmult">Simultaneous actions</link> is
when the character try to do many things at the same time.</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<section id="sactsimple">
<title id="stactsimple">Simple Actions</title>
<para>Simple actions are those that directly oppose a difficulty
to the character's <link linkend="scompniveau">Competency
Level</link>. This difficulty can be choose by the player
(for example, "Do I try to do a great meal or a simple soup?")
or imposed by the Game Master (in a precision shot for
example). We determine then the <link
linkend="scompniveau">Level of Competency</link>, roll the
dice and add the result to the final difficulty to get the
degrees of success.</para>
</section>
<section id="sopposition">
<title id="stopposition">Opposition Actions</title>
<para>Opposition actions put the character in front of an
obstacle able to resist her, her adversary. They can be done
in one or two rolls. The difficulty is always zero. With two
rolls, each adversary roll dice and the one with the greatest
margin of success win. With only one dice roll, the roll is
made with a difficulty equal to the Competency Level of the
character minus the Competency Level of the opponent. If the
degrees of success is greater than zero, the character wins.
If they are less than zero, the opponent wins. If the result
is exactly zero, nobody wins, it's a draw.</para>
</section>
<section id="sconfrontation">
<title id="stconfrontation">Confrontation Actions</title>
<para>Those actions permit a parry from the victim of the
action. An action in confrontation is a variant of the
opposition action and are done in two steps. We begin with a
simple action with, often, a basic difficulty determined by
the player that roll the dice. If the action fails, nothing
happen. But if the action succeed, the adversary can parry
the action by taking the same difficulty but not always the
same Attributes, Competency and adjustments.</para>
<example id="xconfrontation">
<title id="xtconfrontation">Confrontation Actions</title>
<para>A player decide to fast talk a merchant to get a better
price by making him believe that she's not interested by the
item. With the Game Master, they decide that's worth a -3
difficulty and so the players roll under Intuition +
Maneuver + Fast Talk. Since her character have respectively
+2, +3 and -1, this give her a total difficulty of +1. The
player rolls the dice and obtain 6 on her fortune dice, and
5 on her misfortune one. The margin of success is +2 and
so, the player have give a good fast talk. The merchant,
played by the GM, can however parry. The GM decide to roll
under Intuition + Precision + Fast Talk, for which the
merchant has a total of +5. With the -3 difficulty of the
lie of the player, this give him a final difficulty of +2.
If the merchant fail, he will think that the player is less
interest and will <emphasis>may be</emphasis> put down his
prices to interest him a little (or may be he has something
else to show to the player?). If he gets it, the merchant
we have see clear in the player lie and will refuse to put
down his price, being sure that the player is interested to
buy.</para>
</example>
<para>It's important to note that it's really the difficulty
choose at the start by the player and not her degrees of
success that's the difficulty of parry. So, even if in the
previous example, the player has made a success margin of +10,
the difficulty for the parry will still be the same: -3. To
make the roll more difficult for the defender, the player
would have choose a greater difficulty, like pretending to be
a church man with high influence to the lord of the region.
The lie will be more difficult to make believable (a more
difficult roll for the player) but also, if succeed, more
difficult to refute by the merchant ("To lie that's good, it
must be true!").</para>
<note userlevel="adv">
<para>This rule is not intend to be realistic but fun. In
real life, the simpler solution is often the best, but there
is no pleasure without risk.</para>
</note>
</section>
<section id="sactmult">
<title id="stactmult">Multiple Actions</title>
<para>Multiple actions happen when a character try to do many
things at the same time, when she usually can only do one.
Each supplementary action will augment the difficulty of
<emphasis>all</emphasis> actions by three points. So, if a
character try to do three action at the same time, the
difficulty of each action will be increase by 6 points.</para>
</section>
</section>
</chapter>
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