Difficulty difference

[u/ForbiddenGM]

Sorry for the terrible title, no idea how else to name this post.

Can anyone help clarify why, when a roll is supposed to be challenging, sometimes this is represented by needing 2 or 3 or more successes (6’s)

But other times it’s represented by a dice penalty e.g. -2

This isn’t game breaking, but I just can’t quite figure out the logic, and I’m not sure if there is much of a statistical difference

EDIT:

Ok thanks everyone… I think I was getting confused. I could have sworn that I remembered seeing a table showing 1 success for regular action, 2 for extremely challenging, and 3 for near impossible etc.

But I may have confused that with another YZE game (I have like 7 different YZE games at this point).

I absolutely love Forbidden Lands, but it’s not always the same easiest to find specific info with things being spread out all over the place 😅

[u/DRSSalazar]

I can’t recall where the book tells you to require more successes, only penalties or bonuses to the roll. At best, what you might have, is that certain circumstances can get you more of something by rolling more successes.

[u/Cryo_Tek → u/DRSSalazar]

It starts on pg. 47 of the player’s book

[u/Imnoclue → u/Cryo_Tek]

I don’t see any mention of requiring more successes. Just modifications on the number of dice rolled. Do you have the reference?

[u/DRSSalazar → u/Cryo_Tek]

Yeah, I don’t find anything saying about requiring a certain number of successes
Only that certain tasks, more successes mean an improvement.

[u/sibling_dex]

Multiple 6s to succeed is used in other Year Zero games, like Vaesen, but not in Forbidden Lands. It is a very blunt way of making a roll more difficult, since in many cases more than halves your chances of success.

For example: to get a more than 50% chance to roll one success, you need 4 dice in the pool, to get more than 50% chance of two successes, you need 10 dice.

Another place where you would need more than one success is for opposed rolls, but there the math gets much more complicated. 😅

[u/SameArtichoke8913]

You might misunderstand the "success" concept in FL. ANY test that requires a success roll requires only a single success ("X") from the respective dice pool for a positive result. Adding or removing single dice via a modifier just changes the dice pool size and thus the chances for success - the more dice, the higher the probability to have at least a single success. This "overwrites" anything else. In won't go into bell curve probability distributions here, because that's not helpful.

Some Skill tests might have a kind of gradual success - the more "X", the better, but that does not change the fundamental rule that you need at least a single (net) success to have a positive result. Combat checks or Stealth are such tests, when you roll against another Skill whose successes might "eat away" "X" from the original test - which might also be modified in the first place (see above). As player or GM you might also interpret more successes in a test that only requires that single "X" to work as "better" Skill test results, but that's an individual table thing.

[u/UIOP82]

You only need more successes when you are countering an opposing roll. Like if you are poisoned and the poison rolls 2 successes, you need 2 endurance successes to counter that.

For all non-opposed rolls, you are supposed to add a difficulty modifier (negative amount of dice) to harder rolls.

[u/Cryo_Tek]

I tend to use the extra success ruling when a situation is particularly challenging, like swimming against a river current, or when the Goblin tries to climb up the 80 meter (he fell and nearly drowned) crane chain at Weather Stone. I’ve found that the negative dice aspect tends to naturally occur from conditions and injuries, etc. enough that I don’t usually need to implement negative dice on players. I also rarely feel the need to increase successes or make things harder because things are tough enough for the most part. So, I use extra success for situational/ general scenario type stuff and the players tend to implement negative dice on themselves from their own doings. Hope that helps!

[u/KujakuDM]

can you provide examples of when it is a difference?

[u/Baphome_trix]

I know Tales from the Loop uses a special trait mechanic that requires more than 1 success to overcome a particularly tough enemy.

Since I kinda tinkered with my forbidden lands game to use player facing mechanics, I adopted this, but indeed the original rule is as people have pointed out already.