This poll is to address an issue that come up this past Monday during RP.

At times when roleplayers want to introduce a bit of a 'random' aspect to RP, they may voluntarily opt to use a dice roll to determine how their character responds to a given situation, such as combat between two characters. However, there was some dispute earlier in the week regarding how we should handle this. I'd like to establish a baseline rule for us to work off of. Keep in mind: Anyone can opt out of a dice roll when it is used on their character. But if you partake in the dice roll, it would be poor form to not go with the results.

The options are:

Option 1: All or Nothing - This rule indicates that if two people roll the dice, say in combat, if the Attacker wins a roll by any amount, the full intent of their action is carried through, within reason. Anything that's a serious affront to their character (stabbing, death) is automatically gonna be left to the RPer's discretion. This still applies though for combat actions such as shield bashings, knocking your character unconscious, etc. If the Defender's roll is higher, then the Defender can counter and does not need to roll again. Again, the counter should be within reason, otherwise we turn it over to the RPer discretion.

Option 2: Scaled - The Scaled option gives a lot more power to the Defender to interpret the results of the attack, and the Defender's consequences of the role are significantly greater the higher the attacker's roll is above theirs. Basically, if the Attacker were to roll a 650, and the defender a 600, that's not much of a difference. If the attacker were attempting to punch the Attacker's face, it might not be a full connect. They still 'win' the interaction though and the Defender can't counterattack for free. However, if the Attacker roll and 800 and the Defender a 500, that's a pretty solid deck to the face. 800 vs. 300 would probably be strong enough to make them dizzy. 999 vs 100 is probably gonna leave them unconscious, and so on. Please bear and mind that there is no real set 'scale' or rules here to determine how effect the scale is. It is ultimately up to the Defending RPer to play fairly.

Please also remember that, as stated above, no one has to do this in any form. It is 100% acceptable to opt out of any roll, and honestly, I don't want it to become a super huge part of RP anyways. This is only for when RPers are wanting to throw a little bit of risk into the mix.

When I call for a roll, it's either one of three ways:

Threshold – I assign a number and have someone roll and compare the roll to the number I assigned. Use this mainly for 'information' gathering, lore checks, etc. Have to at LEAST make the threshold number to at least "know" the topic, from there it scales to how well you can know the topic.

Scaled – Combat and multiple-part actions. The way I go is pretty close to what Avi's already typed up.

Odd/Even – Coin-flip style. Call "odd or even", whatever the person chooses is what is needed for them to win. Actions that either do or do not happen.

That all being put out there on my end… saying that I'm not a fan of the all or nothing method (AKA "steamroll" actions) is a bit of an understatement. I've had bad experiences with it in the past. I don't mind taking a hit or two or something 'happening' to me, but if a roll is close I'm not going to be happy getting steamrolled, nor am I gonna expect someone to let me steamroll them.

If we go to the steamroll method "officially"… I'm probably going to start bowing out of /randoms. Combat situations especially, I've had a few too many beatings handed to me where I couldn't act/defend because I kept losing rolls by a matter of just a couple points. I'd rather have a match decided in PvP and lose to a level 10 because I lagged the entire time. Or, in non-combat situations, be told "this is what I want to do and this is how you're going to respond/act" when it makes little sense for me to ICly sit there and let things happen exactly that way. It's pretty close to getting godmoded/meta'd at, where I sit.

Rolls have left nothing but bad tastes in my mouth. The last time I used a roll system, I won four consecutive rolls, and lost one, causing me to lose a fight since "Those 4 were minor blows, #5 was the one that really counted." Rolls are ripe for abusing, and I hate even the idea of a battle hardened veteran losing to some special flower because he/she had a few bad rolls. PvP is still my choice for actual fights, even with a level cap set. I know some people hate PvP, but I'm willing to bet that most of them would dislike rolling for a similar reason.

If we absolutely have to have some kind of roll system, we need to set up character sheets with flat stats and nerf the rolls to like a D20. That way there's still some strategy in combat and we don't have common instances of Black Mages physically overpowering Warriors or fully armored Paladins outrunning Thieves.

Rolls aren't a requirement to the RP and never will be, the reason behind this poll is that a dispute accrued that got majorly out of hand because the winner was unhappy with the result of winning the roll by less than 30, not only causing upset with other members currently roleplaying but bringing the whole roleplay to a complete standstill to which it didn't continue for the rest of the day. This poll was the result of 'when' rolls are offered in an RP situation what is the way it will be dealt with. Personally, I've never been in a 'make a roll' situation that was entirely relevant (if i was in a roll to begin with) and frankly it never came to mind to ever offer it in certain instances most people would have asked for (assuming they were into roll to touch my character situations). Several times I've been picked up off of the ground by my collar or another part of my body without so much as an out of character fuss.

Personally, if a result of a roll must be decided, I agree that the defender, in instances of RP PVP situations, has the right to chose just what happens to them based on how much they lost by. Do they feel the roll was enough to be thrown back a few meters or was it simply a shove? Why should someone else dictate how their character moves, acts or reacts to a situation? Unless permission is given, personally no one has the right to demand anything of another roleplayer that directly influences their actions. If it's unintentional and people go with it, consider that permission for at least that instance however don't be surprised if someone says "Actually, I don't like that".

For example, I can't simply say *Lyowa looks up at Kenjii, Kenjii's heart suddenly throbs with emotion and he is barely able to contain himself at the site of the mithra.* Because I am controlling someone else's character without asking, plus am doing something they might also consider completely out of character, in this situation entirely out of character on many fronts, so thus it'd be unacceptable.

So to roll and say something like *Veviriri swings her scythe to cut off Avina's hair!* and in OOC ask Avina to roll and say "If you lose, you're bald now" and then roll but win by say… 20 points, why should I expect Avina to lose more than a thread or clipping of hair? Why should she shave her head just cause I won the roll? It's rather inconsiderate of me to ask such a thing on such a meagre roll. (Or in this case any roll, but it's an example)

Personally, I'd suggest doing away with Rolls entirely, especially if it's going to start to become a big RP destroying problem. We've never required them before, sure the idea of making a little surprise is fine, but in that case why don't we just use it for situations for ourselves, rolling to see what kind of damage we take, like how Draenen did during the end of Promathia, and leave the person against person RP up to the role-players in question and accept whatever they deem as right.

In most situations, rolls are fine. When you're throwing a random aspect in, and you're trying to decide between several options - that's one thing. As soon as you throw rolls into combat… then no. As Kirious said, there's just too much potential for abuse, hurt feelings, and just stupid outcomes.

Once you start rolling for combat, you might as well create stats, because there'll always be one person saying "Oh, well, you shouldn't have won that because I have skillorz that would negate that." In which case, you might as well make character sheets and turn this into DnD. I have nothing against DnD, but I'm here to RP, not have a turn based, dice determining game.

IF there's going to be dice rolls, I would suggest something that makes the outcome clear to both, or all parties. Have one outside person random and follow something like this:

0-250: Character X does A and B, both hit
251-500: Character X does A and hits, B misses
501-750: Character X Misses both, Character Y completely evades
751-999: Character Y evades and counters

Yeah, that should be determined BEFORE the roll. I just hate when people cry 'foul' when they lose. Hence why honestly, I'd rather keep randoms out of combat, and simply use them for plot purposes.

Personally I like scaled rolls. I've started just recently to use them in this RP group (I used them more in forum RPs and other stuff) and it has so far led to interesting and unexpected results.

While I'm not going to talk about the combat aspect (as I agree that stats do matter in this), I want to point out that rolls are useful in other things that we may decide to not leave at our own decision, even when we're rolling on an action by ourselves and thus not 'fighting' someone else's roll..

Example: exploring a new dungeon. How to avoid going straight to the right room? If the character has no map, to roll in coin-style (odd/even) to decide which way to go at a fork. RP it being the adventurer's 'feeling' of the right direction to take.

The scaled roll instead is also awesome to determine what happens to ourselves even out of combat. Kenjii losing his MH pass was the result of an horrible roll after he had entrusted the document to Mirror.

900+: The document was still there where Kenjii had left it when he gave the vest to Mirror.
650-899: The document had been dropped along the way, but no one had picked it.
300-650: The document had been dropped and someone had picket it up.
0-299: The document was lost forever in the water.

I rolled 57 or something like that that day, good stuff <.<

I didn't expect it to go that bad, yet I went along with it and have quite enjoyed the consequences. An all-or-nothing roll would've cut off a good part of those options, so I think it's somehow a limit to RP to go for it.

So yes, rolling when used well can add quite some fun to someone's RP. Not saying to make it a must, but it's worth trying.

Just to clarify, I'm not a fan of doing rolls for entire fights. Much like Kirious, I'd rather take a fight to Brenner and PvP out a fight. I probably should've said 'physical confrontations' rather than 'combat' – meaning shoves, one-shot punches, slaps, grabbing someone from behind, etc.