KibblesTasty
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Poll: Does crafting need a "Crafting Roll"?
🕑 Added 2020-11-06 01:21:51 +0000 UTCOne of the most back and forth parts of Crafting that's delayed getting it into your hands is the contention around the "crafting roll" and what purpose it serves in crafting. With the latest version, a fundamental question has been asked a lot... does crafting even need a roll?
The fundamental principle of crafting is turning materials into stuff. A consistent part of the feedback is that players hate when they end up during materials into nothing by failing a crafting roll. This is factored into the entropy of the system (i.e. the cost of materials vs. the cost of the finished item accounts for the possibility of failure) but consistently the feedback has been that no matter how generously this calculated, players often refuse to make a roll that could result in losing precious materials, or report that making the roll only feels like potential for punishment, while passing the roll feels expected.
One thing I experimented earlier with only have good outcomes from the rolls - i.e. success was assured, but you could get a better version of it via the roll, but this fundamentally upset the balance when the margins are too tight (some things just don't have much room to get better while still being balance resulting an uneven distribution of results).
So we get the question... does crafting even need a roll?
That it would use a roll was one of my fundamental assumptions going in, but it was predicated on the fact that Players like to roll... but almost universally the feedback has been so far from testers that players didn't find this particular kind of roll fun, and ultimately I don't think it is necessary to the system, so I put it to you, the patron voters:
Comments
I personally like the concept of crafting rolls and potentially failing to craft something. Maybe there is a chance to make it more dependent on the equipment used, like bonuses on the crafting roll. If you use your mobile Smith's Tools the added bonus is minimal, but if you get a local smith to let you use his full-fledged smithy, the added bonus makes it really hard to fail, at least for a trained smith. For everything arcana related I'm sure you could find something similar.
Eliot
Rare materials are hard to work with, and even a skilled surgeon has a chance at failure even if they have all the tools. Same with ores and smelting, sometimes it just is no good. I'd make the chance very small mind you [depending on your skill], like 5% or less if at high skill.
